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  "documentTitle": "American Tower (AMT)",
  "authorId": "51_Muddy_Waters",
  "authorName": "Carson C. Block",
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  "sourceTypeSlug": "short_seller",
  "sourceTypeLabel": "Short seller",
  "presentationDate": "2013-07-17 00:00:00",
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  "notes": "The slide uses a table to highlight the high disposal ratio of shares by the CEO, framing it as a negative signal of management alignment.",
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      "text": "To exacerbate this, AMT CEO Jim Taiclet sells approximately 90% of the shares he receives from option exercises, as shown in the table below.",
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      "kind": "list",
      "text": "CCI separates the chairman and CEO positions. CCI does not compensate senior management for tower acquisitions.",
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      "text": "Disposal Ratio: 88.5%",
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      "kind": "paragraph",
      "text": "We make comparisons to Crown Castle International Corp. (NYSE: CCI) throughout this report because it is managed in a much more sustainable and prudent fashion than is AMT.",
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      "text": "We believe that the financial targets should however be adjusted to exclude the impact of AMT's de facto lending business, in which it books loan repayments as revenue, thereby artificially boosting EBITDA margins and other operating metrics.",
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      "text": "We see the specific causes of AMT's overseas value destruction as being CEO and senior management compensation tied to international tower acquisitions... To exacerbate this, AMT CEO Jim Taiclet sells approximately 90% of the shares he receives.",
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      "text": "We are inclined to take a skeptical view of any company whose CEO sells substantially all of the shares he acquires from option exercises. CEOs ideally think about the share price years down the road, and manage accordingly.",
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      "text": "Source Bloomberg",
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      "text": "52 AMT 2013 Proxy Statement, p. 28. 53 AMT 2013 Proxy Statement, p. 27.",
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