Parlux chief cashes in on share success
company he heads by cashing in on shares he owned indirectly in the
business, gaining a cool $11.67 million in the process.
In a filing made with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on February 17, Parlux CEO Ilea Lekach put his signature to company shares that were registered in the name of the Pacific Investment Group, in which he has a controlling stake, and the IZJD Corporation, which his family wholly owns.
In total 350,000 Parlux shares were sold at a share price that averaged $33.36 per share between February 15 and 16.
The sale means that Lekach owns 616,800 shares in his own name and a further 410,250 which is co-owned by his direct family through IZJD.
Many profitable share sell-offs by key company executives have given way to 'fat cat' accusations in the past, but key executives have retaliated, justifying their earnings by tying the returns to the profits they have generated for the company through sound management principles.
Although the cosmetics industry has not been a main focus for this type of criticism in the past, the fact that US CEOs are currently paid the highest salaries in the world often puts them in the spot light with regards to pay-offs.
Indeed, there has even been several instances of low-performing executives receiving multi-million dollar pay-offs just to get rid of them, which has further fuelled the protesting campaigns.
However, more recently the SEC has started to put pressure on high executive payments, stating that obscured executive payments can often distort company performances.
In the case of Parlux, the payments have been made entirely public and advocates of rewards for high performance executives would argue that Lekach's share profits are justified.
Perhaps the fact that last month Parlux reported a 95 per cent rise in its third quarter sales and a doubling of earnings to $57m might go some of the way to backing up Lekach's new-found wealth.
