Insider trading

Listed companies won't, after all, have to give a breakdown of managers' salaries. The Senate struck down the requirement yesterday. This is the latest of a long line of news that casts a bad light on the public markets. There's also the case of board members of state-owned companies who gave up their government posts to cash in on millions in stock options. Or the admission by the SEC that it hasn't proven a single case of price- rigging on the Prague Stock Exchange. Or observations by Petr Zajíc of Pioneer and others that prices on the PSE haven't risen in the past 10 years. Experts warned in Czech Business Weekly that delisting Český Telecom could cripple the PSE. Perhaps the bigger threat is the perception that the stock exchanges and many listed companies are controlled, managed and regulated by a narrow group of people who are making all the money. [Czech Republic Securities and Exchange Commission supervisory board directors]