I assume that stock was in the form of restricted stock units that vest over the course of a few years. I’ve seen this kind of thing play out at a few big tech companies over the years and have seen people lose literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in delayed payout.
They offer these as a “loyalty incentive” so the employee wants to stay while of course offering no loyalty in return when they decide to execute layoffs.
Yes, I am certain that was the case. It was the case in my examples too… Every now and then someone gets through and gets a couple units to vest, but the majority are gone and so is that compensation. It’s disgusting.
One of the worst instances was one year that virtually all “merit increases” were instead replaced with RSUs that vested in a year. When I had to bring that to my team and tell them what they were getting… Well, not a single one of us expected to see that money. Sure enough, layoffs happened and that potential money evaporated before any of us saw a cent. None of us were unprepared or surprised, but obviously still unhappy.
Hold my beer - Bungie (lemmy.zip)