Low-Hanging Wires, Er, Fruit
The Post piles on Con Ed chairman Kevin Burke, noting that the recent blackout may lead to an Enron-esque boost for his stock options:
Posted: July 27th, 2006 | Filed under: That's An Outrage!Kevin Burke, the embattled Con Ed chairman who relocated Queens into the Third World, could make a bundle off his company’s stocks, thanks to the blackout.
Con Ed’s stock closed at $45.21 on Friday, July 14, the last trading day before the electricity went out for more than 100,000 people in the borough on the following Monday.
Yesterday, the stock finished at $47.19 — up 4.4 percent from July 14.
Power broker Burke owns 272,625 shares and options of Consolidated Edison, according to regulatory filings.
This means that while northwest Queens was sweating in the sweltering darkness, the total value of Burke’s paper holdings surged $560,000.
Experts say that utility stocks are generally very stable — Con Ed’s hasn’t moved more than a few percentage points all year — but crisis situations where supply is limited can boost trader speculation and investor interest.
Burke’s windfall is in addition to his $1.5 million salary and bonus.
