Sallie Mae CEO: 'Let's get the $%$% outta here!'

Posted Dec 21st 2007 11:31AM by Zac Bissonnette
Filed under: Management, SLM Corp (SLM)

Sallie Mae (NYSE: SLM)'s earnings conference call went a little off-kilter. Reminiscent of former Enron CEO Jeff Skilling's "a**hole" comment, the Washington Post tells the story. After a bad quarter that sent the stock plummeting, CEO Albert Lord offered few details of his plans for the company on the conference call.

William Kavaler, a managing director of the French bank Societe Generale: "We're trying to figure out what your stock is going to be worth, and you've got to give us some guidance, you've got to give us some numbers."

Lord: "You should give Steve (head of investor relations) a call."

Kavaler: "But you're the CEO. You're the guy who just took over the company."

Lord: "Yeah ... that's exactly right. I'm the CEO. You should give Steve a call. Next question."

Oh but that was only the beginning of Lord's rudeness. After four questions and a pause while the operator compiled the queue, Lord declared the call over in an off-color remark that could be heard by conference call participants: "Steve, let's go. No questions. Let's get the [expletive] out of here."

Here's a tip for Mr. Lord: When your company's stock is in the toilet and you've just rejoined as CEO again after a merger unraveled... don't antagonize analysts/shareholders.

At the beginning of the call, Lord said that the purpose of the call was to "reacquaint myself with you, and you with me and try to create some transparency by me as CEO."

I think we can declare that mission a failure.

Here's a great video from TheStreet.com with some commentary on the call.

Tags: Albert Lord, AlbertLord, inthenews, obscenity, profanity, Sallie Mae, SallieMae, SLM