Facebook's Employees Likely Still Cheering Despite Stock Cooling

May 22, 2012 — -- As Facebook's stock hovers around $33 a share on Tuesday, Mark Zuckerberg's stock value may have decreased over $2 billion since the company went public on Friday. But don't cry for the boy wonder CEO and his cadre of staffers and insiders who cashed in on last week's IPO.

Check out a "Who's Who" infographic of Facebook employees.

Facebook's earliest employees and investors may be less concerned about the company's stock price after they joined founder Zuckerberg, 28, on stage as he rang Nasdaq's opening bell from the company's headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. Most Facebook employees holding vested restricted stock units and option grants will need to wait until 181 days, or six months after the IPO effective date for the shares on their vested grants to be eligible for sale.

Even with the stock down over 3 percent on Tuesday in intra-day trading and 20 percent from Friday's high, the employees on stage who received a handsome stock award or options are "still doing better than most people," said Brian Foley, pay consultant and managing director of Brian Foley & Co. in White Plains, N.Y.

At least 11 of the Facebook employees pictured above have degrees from Stanford University or Harvard University. At least 12 of the pictured Facebook employees are under the age of 40. Zuckerberg, possibly the youngest person on stage, is half the age of Bob Greifeld, CEO of Nasdaq.

Greifeld, 54, was the oldest person pictured above.

However, Facebook's culture, led by the hoodie-clad CEO, may preclude major conspicuous spending among employees and their newfound wealth, so will "lockup" period rules which prevent employees from selling most of their stock immediately.

The value of stock owned by the four executive officers pictured above decreased by as much as $2.4 billion according to Monday's closing price of $34.03 from Friday's close of $38.23.

Zuckerberg lost about $2.1 billion from Friday to Monday. Based on Monday's closing price, he still owns about $17.1 billion worth of stock even after selling 30 million shares in the IPO. Zuckerberg owns about 383.8 million shares in stock and 120 million in options, according to executive compensation research firm, Equilar. That's on top of his base salary of $500,000 in 2011, according to the company's S-1 filing.

The value of stock for chief operating officer Sherl Sandberg fell about $195.8 million in the last two full days of trading. She still owns about $1.5 billion in Facebook stock based on Monday's closing price, according to Equilar.

Sandberg, 42, has 41.9 million in stock and 4.7 million in options. Forbes reports Sandberg's restricted stock units would have to continue to trade at least at the offer price for her to be a billionaire by the time many of them vest, November 18. After some of Sandberg's stock is available in November, additional stock may be available as early as 2013.

Sandberg had a base salary of $300,000 in 2011, according to the company's S-1 filing.

Facebook's other high-level employees also own millions of dollars in stock.

Michael Schroepfer, 37, Facebook's vice president of engineering since September 2008, lost about $42.7 million in the value of his stock in the last two trading days.

His Facebook stock is valued at about $338.4 million with Monday's closing price, according to Equilar. Schroepfer had a base salary in 2011 of $275,000.

David Fischer, 39, the company's vice president of marketing and business partnerships joined Facebook in April 2010 and his stock lost about $12.2 million in value in the last two trading days. He still owns about $98.7 million in stock, according to Equilar, based on Monday's closing price.

Facebook's other young billionaires, including co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and once Facebook president Sean Parker, weren't on stage with Zuckerberg on Friday morning. Not surprisingly, they are still billionaires despite the lower stock price.

Foley said he suspects those on the stage had "substantial to significant" stock awards, "not because they are necessarily significant folks but I assume they spread the wealth" as "there is so much wealth to go around."

Their awards would depend on when they came on board, their perceived impact on the company and any accomplishments with the company thus far.

According to the company's S-1 filings, vested, restricted stock unit grants for general employees will be delivered six months after the IPO. Awards given before 2011 generally vested or will vest over four years.

Foley said vesting over four years is not unusual for a public tech company for normal size grants.

Whatever their pay, Foley said most outside investors would hope employees had a vesting schedule to incentivize employees to stay with the company.

"I would just like to moderate the drain somewhat, so there is more than enough once the initial restrictions come off. They could still buy the house they want to buy, but I would hope for some restrictions so there is value on the table to encourage them to stay and work," Foley said. "It would be interesting to see how they do in terms of the current generation of Facebook employees."