Bear Stearns Fat Cats Cashed Out at the Top

The facts?

Between the end of November 2006 and the end of March this year, former Bear Stearns boss -- and current executive committee chairman -- Greenberg sold 179,277 shares at an average price of about $161, raising a total of $28.8 million.

Today the value of those shares has collapsed by $7.7 million to just $21.1 million.

After deducting his stock option costs, Greenberg made $17.7 million in profits before tax. Had he waited till now to sell the shares, he would have made just $10 million.

Nice work if you can get it, as they say.

Greenberg was not alone. Between December last year and the end of March, the now-ousted co-president Warren Spector dumped 116,255 shares at an average price of $164, raising a total of $19.1 million.

The value of those shares today: just $13.7 million.

After option expenses, Spector made $16.4 million. That's $5.4 million more than he would have made if he had waited.

Last December chairman and CEO James Cayne cashed out 46,415 shares at around $165, raising $7.6 million

Value today? Two million dollars less.

And Samuel Molinaro, the chief financial officer who just got promoted to chief operating officer thanks to the company's financial crisis, saved himself more than $400,000 by selling shares last December for $1.5 million instead of waiting until now.

It is, perhaps, a shame that Bear Stearns' two disastrous hedge funds didn't prove as nimble and astute in their trading as the guys at the top. Instead, they were caught holding junk mortgage paper as default rates soared.

Stock sales weren't the only way top executives at Bear Stearns pocketed a fortune even as they sailed the Titanic straight at the iceberg. Company filings reveal that Bear Stearns also awarded a staggering $140 million in bonuses to top executives last year.

And by good fortune, just over half of those bonuses were paid in cash rather than in the company's fast-shrinking shares.