I wouldn't count the equity appreciation as compensation. you already own the capital, its your own capital gain, not income from employer at that point.
Yes, but you should value them at 100k, because it is the functional equivalent of getting a 100k cash bonus, that you (instead of diversifying) foolishly spent on buying a single company's stock.
You don't actually need to work at Facebook to sink 100k into buying Facebook stock (That you then forbid yourself from selling for 4 years).
> that you (instead of diversifying) foolishly spent on buying a single company's stock
So, it is actually a bit more complicated, and better than that, and long term stock grants act as a psuedo stock hedge.
This is a simplification, but imagine that there is stock worth X, that hs a 50% chance of the stock doubling in value, and a 50% chance of it crashing to 0$. You might think that this would be equivalent in expected value to X, but that is not true.
It is not true, because if the stock goes way down, you don't have to "accept" those losses. Instead, you can jump to another company, mid way through, and get back your previously high salary.
In that way you can capture the upside potential, while also being protected against the downside losses, in that if the stock goes down, you just jump ship, and get a high salary somewhere else.
This is because if the stock goes way down, and you are 1 year into your 4 year vest, then you can leave the company, and get a high compensation package somewhere else.
Do you understand how this makes it so you have free downside protection, from those other 3 years, because you can leave and get the high salary somewhere else, if the stock crashes?
Since RSUs vest over time, the penny-for-penny equivalent financial transaction for receiving $100K worth of RSUs over 4 years, would be for me to receive $100K of cash compensation over 4 years, and using it to buy stock (That I can't sell for X months).
There's no advantage to RSUs. Cash is better in every way, because, at worst, you can invest it in the exact same allocation that your RSUs are invested in. Any gain from them rising in price could have been realized by investing cash. Any loss from them falling in price is a real, not a paper loss. [1]
I'll take $100 of cash over $100 of RSUs any day. I probably wouldn't take $80 of cash over $100 of RSUs, though.
[1] Unless for some weird reason, you are accounting your personal finances, where a 4-year stock grant is realized in year 1. If you are doing this, you should stop, because it is not an accurate way to do accounting.
High package elsewhere is not free money... Also leaving the company isn’t free (you lose unvested shares, atleast). this isn’t arbitrage. even arbitrage usually has some carrying risk in between the two transactions.
It’s basically guaranteed at this point. And you don’t own the capital, you don’t start getting the massively appreciated grants until you are a few years in