Every month, Compliance Week publishes a list of the largest stock option grants and restricted stock awards during the previous period. The data and analysis are provided by compensation research firm Equilar.

THE DATA

Please note that all values are rough “face value” numbers that are calculated by data provider Equilar by multiplying the number of shares in the grant by the market price per share on the grant date.

Latest Data

The spreadsheet below lists the largest awards for May and previous months in 2010.

View the Top Equity Awards Made in May

Prior Years’ Data

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2009

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2008

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2007

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2006

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2005

View Equity Awards From Each Month in 2004

Source: Equilar Inc.

The largest equity awards in May were doled out by NVR Inc., a home-building company in Reston, Va., that gave the largest awards of both stock options and restricted stock. On May 12, it awarded 57,344 options to CEO Paul Saville with a strike price of $703, implying a face value of $40.3 million. Saville also received a grant of 21,046 shares on that same day worth $14.6 million, based on a grant-date value of $693.93 per share.

Likewise, NVR Chief Financial Officer Dennis Seremet received a grant of 24,261 stock options with a face value of $17 million, and 8,904 shares of restricted stock worth $6.2 million. And company Controller Robert Henley received an award of 4,047 shares worth $2.8 million.

Other companies awarding large grants of stock options in May included McKesson, Motorola, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Merck. Companies giving large grants of restricted stock included Dell, Tesoro Corp., Raytheon, Bed Bath & Beyond, Electronic Arts, and Merck. A downloadable spreadsheet of those awards can be found in the box above, right.

Trends, Performance

No companies granted options in May with premium pricing, continuing a chaotic pattern since the financial crisis of 2008. Before the crisis, such grants were routine, since the higher exercise price prodded executives to push share prices higher. They have been much more sporadic, however, since the financial crisis threw Wall Street into turmoil 18 months ago.

Only one company awarded equity compensation last month with a shorter vesting period than it did in the previous year: On May 20, Intevac granted options to six executives with a term length of seven years, when it previously had a term length of 10 years. Shorter vesting terms have become popular because they can lessen the effect of stock-option expensing.

Equilar also noted that companies did continue to issue performance-based equity awards. On May 4, for example, comScore granted options to five executives with the following performance-related footnote:

“The above listed stock option award is subject to market-based vesting, whereby 100 percent of the number of shares subject to option shall vest in the event that comScore’s common stock closing price as reported by the NASDAQ Stock Market exceeds an average of $30 per share for a 30-day period prior to May 4, 2012. 50 percent of the number of shares subject to option would vest upon achievement of the trigger and the remaining 50 percent of the number of shares subject to option would vest on the one-year anniversary of the date of achievement of the trigger, subject to the optionee’s continued status as a service provider of the company as of such date.”

On May 10, Lender Processing Services—which is under investigation by state and federal authorities for sloppy recordkeeping in its mortgage business—granted restricted stock to nine executives with the following performance-related footnote:

“Subject to the additional requirements in the next sentence, one-third of the aggregate number of shares of restricted stock granted vest on each of the first three anniversaries of the date of grant. In addition, the vesting of the restricted stock is subject to the company achieving $150 million in annual market share gain on or before December 31, 2011.”

And on May 11, THQ Inc. granted restricted stock units to seven executives with the following performance-related footnote:

“The Performance Accelerated Restricted Stock Units (PARSUs) will vest five years after the grant date; however, vesting may be accelerated if certain company-related performance criteria are met each fiscal year during the term of the PARSUs. The PARSUs will be settled one-for-one in shares of common stock upon vesting, unless the participant has elected to defer receipt of PARSUs pursuant to the THQ Inc. Stock Unit Deferred Compensation Plan.”

A downloadable spreadsheet of the top 10 equity awards in May can be found in the box above, right. Also available are data from 2004-2009.