Former HP CEO Mark Hurd rewarded with a $40m severance after being forced to resign over fraudulent expense reports
By Nilay Patel 
posted August 6th 2010 7:17PM
posted August 6th 2010 7:17PM
Worried that former HP CEO Mark Hurd might not know what to do with himself after getting caught falsifying expense reports to hide girl #2 and being forced to resign? Don't be: ol' Mark's getting a $12,224,693 severance payment in exchange for agreeing not to sue HP. Yep, Mark Hurd just got $12 million in cash for fraudulently filing expense reports to conceal his mistress -- not a bad trick if you can pull it off, we suppose. (We don't know how much he'll have to pay back, but we're guessing he'll have a little cash left over.) Oh, and he's also having his option to buy 775,000 shares of HP stock extended to September, which is pretty groovy considering HP actually upped its quarterly forecast today, some other assorted stock-related compensation, and 18 months of health and dental benefits. Whoever said a little white collar crime doesn't pay?Update: CNBC has sources claiming the total value of Hurd's severance including stocks is closer to $40-50 million, give or take. That's... well, that's a lot of ink cartridges.
I used to work for HP (Now work for the DoD) I was told by my boss that taking anything from the company (even a pen) constitutes theft and will result in prosecution. WTF HP?
Son of a bi**h
Makes me disgusted to be using a HP computer at this moment.
When are the people of this country going to start thinking about these things and sorting out their politics so we can see something a little more like Justice done.
I thought the traditional reward for sexual harassment was a slap in the face? ...not receiving $40m. Apparently, my morality is wrong. Need more harass.
Hey! That song uses French House in it!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8TnbLLLyRk
Carly was worse !
/facepalm
Who's the bigger sack of excrement here. The disgraced CEO or the board of directors that gave him that money?
Good job hp!! Sh*tbags
Im as much of a fan of severance packages and anyone else who isnt A CEO or Conan O'Brien, but its a smart move for HP. They can pay their former CEO 50 mil to stay out of trouble, or get sued by him for 100-200 mil.
im not even going to say anything about capitalism or socialism because i dont have a full understanding of it all or how severance packages fit into them the way they do, and neither does anyone else. This isnt a business law and US court system blog after all.
@Karate Tortoise
Capitalism and Socialism are flaw ....To much Greed for both to work....
All I want to know is where is my goddam golden parachute?
You have taken "our" money. .. ... ... & for your punishment, I give you "MORE MONEY" - I hope others will learn from your mistake.... ... .. .
[read this aloud:] Overheard at the last HP executive retreat... A marketing consultant.
Anyway, it's all Bush's fault!
Sorry about that; I was just channeling my inner libtard.
What a douche!! The whole time he was taking pay and benefits away from HP employees, this ahole was cheating the company out of money and screwing around with mistresses!! And he gets 40 million to walk away!! Low life piece of crap!! What about all those poor HP employees he cut?? They got nothing. What a joke!!
I swear I can hear steve jobs liver laughing...,,,
It's hard to believe this. CEO? Contractor? Sexual harassment charge could just be a smoke screen. In such cases the public never come to know the truth.
Allegedly falsifying expense claims is not fraud, by the way. If proven, it would potentially be dishonest but not necessarily. My point is to be careful saying there is a "white collar crime" etc and that the HP CEO is being rewarded for crime. Did he otherwise do a terrible job? If the stock price is up then perhaps not? If he is not entitled to any remuneration now just because of one mistake (allegedly) then isn't that pretty unfair on him? The stock holders would then get all that value and he gets nothing? That would be wealth re-distribution par excellence.
@mojopagoda I probably used too many ?
HP is not better than the others ... all of them are th$eves (and some of them are stup!d)
" it's a big club...and you ain't in it"
- George Carlin
fucking ass-hole executives - they are almost all corrupt.
I wonder if he knows something everyone else shouldn't and the severance is a shut-up reward.
I believe most people that break the law and commit fraud lose their pension and don't get severance, or at least not enough to not have to work for the rest of their lives.
Looks like I need to get into the falsifying reports business!
So when you REWARD someone that is as corrupt and/or incompetent as this guy to the tune of $40,000,000, where is the incentive to actually do a good job?!?
Once again Corporate America proving how out of touch and horribly run it is.
It's amazing. Once you reach a certain level it seems impossible to fail. Especially when it comes to Severance packages and bonuses. You can run your company into the ground, defraud governments, etc and these crooks still get massive bonus pay and parachutes on the way out. Then they get to gloss over their failures by spending all their money buying Senate seats because of the "Awesome jobs they did in the private sector."
So HP gave us Carley and now this clown? I'm going to find it real hard to want to purchase any of their products in the future.
It makes you wonder if he could have made it an even $50 million if he had gone all the way with full rape and embezzlement?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTyJii4wRWY&feature=related
In the great words of Jon Stewart
"I give yup"...
I think I'm going to reduce my moral standards, than maybe I can become a CEO!!!
He gets paid by the company for committing a crime against the company....just fantastic......bs
Carly was way worse...she was the idiot that sank HP while she was in charge.
Huh?? Is that a reward or punishment??!! Makes you think HP has a lot more secrets...
His supposed mistress was pretty good looking and had a nice body, but he still threw away one of the best jobs in the world and undoubtedly upset his family. No woman is worth going through all this, but especially not a 50 year old that could be a granny. He and Mark Sanford will have a lot to talk about with all the free time on their hands.
Third party ink cartridges, HP branded? Not so much.