The NASPP Blog

November 24, 2009

Anapestic Ballad for 83(b)

Since it’s a holiday week, I thought I’d do something a little lighter with the blog. Today I’m featuring a poem by John Hammond of Computershare (and poet laureate of the NASPP blog).

There won’t be a blog on Thursday, since it’s Thanksgiving and I hope you all will be spending time with your friends and families, giving thanks, doing whatever you do to celebrate national holidays, and not reading blogs about stock compensation.

Anapestic Ballad for 83(b)
By John Hammond

         “We don’t allow the use of 83(b)”
You don’t?
         No, we don’t
But how can that be?
It’s tax code my friend, it’s a natural thing
It’s the essence of harmony – it’s the I Ching
Messing with tax? It’s like building a dam
to steal all the water – then flooding your land
The consequences are never as you intended
Just wait ’til it’s the CEO you’ve offended
And what would you do if a person – just one
You the tax police now with your little tax gun?
And he blinked his eyes slowly with a slight roll toward the back
To begin his retort of my little attack
         It’s all in our plan… it’s as we intended
         To change it would require it to be amended…
I certainly won’t argue what’s in your plans
Your plans are your plans and that’s just how it stands
But I am curious to know all the whys and the whats
More than one plan design has been done by a yutz
         We don’t believe in them
You don’t believe?
It ain’t Santa Claus and this ain’t Christmas Eve
The 83(b) has been a wonderful code
For those who have used it – sure, you have to be bold
My favorite use was with AMT
When companies use to grant ISOs… before one twenty three
It took an early exercise on repurchaseable shares
And the AMT gods had to sit back and stare 
         and say “Well done!”
Well Done!? Perfect, I say!
I have accelerated nothing, so nothing I’ll pay
There has to be more…more than “I don’t believe”
To abolish the code of 83(b)
         Our vendor can’t handle the process today
         We would track offline ’til systems were changed
         It’s not worth the risk or the mess or the fuss
         To handle the manual process of this stuff
Have you considered RSUs an alternative way
Versus saying you don’t and walking away
With an RSU you could say, “we would, but cannot
There is no transfer ‘cos property it’s not”
It may just be diction… but diction’s a lot
         We’ll consider your advice when we make our next plan
         But it won’t change the past and it won’t change those grants
         Which at our burn rate, will be 2010
And I left my friend and I went on my way
And thought of the thoughts we had thought of that day
And I didn’t like it as friend or as foe
Or as tax code groupie – I’m weird… yeah, I know
In his shoes, I would have hoped I’d stood strong
‘Cos messin’ with tax code is really just wrong.

John Hammond is a VP of Sales with Computershare.

NASPP Conference Audio Now Available

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NASPP “To Do” List
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– Barbara