Sirius (SIRI) CEO Mel Karmazin may not be good at bolstering his company's sagging stock price, but he sure is good at alienating shareholders. Karmazin, who has seen SIRI shares tumble more than 80% under his tenure, added insult to injury this week. NYT:
Unlike most companies — whose shareholder base is 80 percent big institutional investors and 20 percent personal, retail investors — Sirus’s shareholder base is turned upside-down. As a result, many of the radio network’s fans and customers are also its owners. They fill chat rooms online and have made the stock a volatile one. “A lot of them are unsophisticated, but they have a passion for the company,” he said.
We wonder if Karmazin is including himself in this category, since he just purchased another two million shares of SIRI stock. Other nuggets from the interview:
- Karmazin's proudest accomplishment at Viacom was making the film Jackass
- He has no "Jewish guilt" over SIRI's fancy Midtown headquarters and joked that when the lease expires, he'll move the company to Queens or New Jersey
- He isn't worried about the slowing economy, since, at 43 cents per day, SIRI's product is cheaper than "vending machine coffee."
- With regard to auto sales, Mel remains optimistic because the high rate of consumers choosing to install Sirius is greater than 50%.
