Ahmed Fahour is stepping out the door at Australia Post in July, but it will take another decade for the organisation to deliver his final package.
It will be worth the wait.
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Ahmed Fahour's shock Australia Post resignation
Mr Fahour surprisingly announced on Wednesday that he would resign just weeks after the revelation of his $5.6 million salary caused a national furore and drew the ire of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
The chief postie – like the rest of his posties – managed to qualify for the defined benefit scheme, which means his super payout is based on his final salary and years of service rather than the more modest defined contribution scheme most of us are familiar with.
You get a lump sum based on a formula that works something like this: final salary multiplied by years of full-time service multiplied by 14.3 per cent.
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Let's assume Fahour's final actual salary is $1.7 million. We don't know this for sure but it was his base pay in 2013-14 and has not been disclosed since then. Mind you, we might get lucky this week when his chairman, John Stanhope, fronts the Senate committee to explain how somebody running a tax payer-owned asset could earn so much.
That formula gives Fahour a lump sum payment of $1.7 million.
The downside for Fahour is that he will not get his hands on this pot of money until he turns 60. The young gun turned 50 last October, so no wonder Fahour thinks he has another corporate gig in him yet.
Clown casino
The poor sods on the board at James Packer's Crown Resorts. It's really hard to keep things sweet with the ASX fuzz when Crown sources are so busy leaking to its favoured spruikers in the press.
The resignation of a CEO – you know, like Crown's Rowan Craigie – is a big deal.
And the ASX regulatory branch was not happy that this news was already on the front pages of Rupert Murdoch's The Australian and CBD stablemate The Australian Financial Review well before Crown deemed it necessary to tell the market.
So how do you twist your way out of the casino group's apparent inability to get this market-sensitive information to the market "immediately" but did manage to get it into print at major newspapers the previous evening?
We were concerned that Crown management changes were leaked to the press and are pleased @ASX formally queried them https://t.co/ke3bHzCiFR
— Australian Shares (@AustSharesAssoc) February 24, 2017
In reply to the ASX's please explain notice, Crown told the regulators late on Friday that the announcement reflected agreement reached between Crown and the two parties in question: Craigie as the departing CEO, and executive chairman John Alexander who is effectively taking his role.
"The negotiation took a number of days and concluded at approximately 10.11am on Thursday, 23 February 2017," said Crown, without explaining this long goodbye.
Crown then hotfooted this breaking news to the market two minutes later at 10.13 am. Glad we cleared that one up.
Hot Copper
What on earth are they drinking in Cloncurry?
The home of colourful Queensland copper group, Cudeco, had a lot going on over the biggest week of the corporate reporting season.
The week started badly when Cudeco announced that the Department of Natural Resources & Mines had forced it to suspend operations at its Rocklands copper mine after it failed a safety audit.
Not a good look given it had only just commenced copper production after a decade lost in the wilderness trying to make the transition from explorer to miner. "The health and safety of our workforce is our number one priority. We will endeavour to address this issue as quickly as possible for the benefit of all our employees and contractors, and ultimately, shareholders," said interim chairman Peter Hutchison.
It was Hutch's fourth day as chairman, following the abrupt resignation of Noel White the previous week "effective immediately" to focus on his other commitments.
The day after its operations had been shut by the safety audit, Dr Dianmin Chen brought forward his resignation as managing director to make it effective immediately rather than April.
Luckily, Cudeco managed to appoint a new chief executive that very afternoon.
No. They did not invite the legendary Wayne McCrae back from the wilderness. They found another outsider in the form of Mark Gregory.
"The board believes that Mark is the right person to drive the company forward," said Hutch in the letter to shareholders released on the Wednesday.
To think it was only nine months ago that Hutch himself was running the operation as Cudeco's interim managing director.
Follow CBD on Twitter. Got a tip? ckruger@fairfaxmedia.com.au