Findings of APPLs Stock Option Mess

We got some mea culpa from Apple and one resignation so far. It seems like it was all before 2002 though so the current team should be okay.

Apple's investigation "committee" consisting of outside directors,
together with independent counsel and accountants confirmed a clean record of
the current leadership, but revealed somewhat unexpected results. After
searching through 650,000 emails and interviews with "more than 40 current and former employees, directors and advisors," the team identified "stock option
grants made on 15 dates between 1997 and 2002 [that] appear to have grant dates that precede the approval of those grants." The most recent "irregularity" dates back to a January 2002 grant.

Checking out those 650K e-mails must have been quite a job in itself. I would have hated being on that "committee." Maybe they used some kind of filtering software that searched out every usage of the word options or something to make it less work.