Employee Share Options and Firm Performance

The impact of employee share option schemes (ESOs) on the performance of two companies of differing sizes, listed on the Stock Exchange in Malaysia,were studied. ESOs is supposed to align the interest of owners and managers and hence improve corporate perforamnce. However, the results indicate that deterioration in financial performance was not arrested by ESOs and the smaller firm experienced a greater deterioration. The alignment of interest theory may not be applicable as the majority owners are also the managers. This study concludes that ESOs do not motivate employees and thus the objectives were not fulfilled and that the main beneficiaries are the majority owners/managers and the losers are the minority shareholders.