What happens to unvested RSUs when a public company is bought out by private firm?
I would ask your HR or benefits department to be certain, but here's how I read that without any specific knowledge of the situation: What is right to receive the RSU consideration? Company A was bought by Company B.  You had unvested Restricted Stock Units in A, which is now gone.  B is saying that you now have the right to receive consideration equivalent to the value of those RSUs in A. Since B is private, there's no publicly traded stock, so it will likely be in cash, but read the rest of the paperwork or talk to HR to be certain.   For example, if you had 100 RSUs vesting next year and the price of stock in A was $50 when the company was bought, those RSUs would be worth $5,000.  B is give you the right to consideration for those RSUs, hopefully for somewhere around $5,000.  That consideration is unvested, meaning you must stay employed until the vesting period in order to claim that right. If you are fired without cause (i.e. laid off), you will receive those unvested claims as compensation.   I assume the same will be applicable if employee leaves the company  Probably not.  In any situation, if you voluntarily leave a company, any unvested stock, RSUs, options, etc. are forfeited.
"Seems like no one in this thread has heard of ""treasury stocks"", which indeed allow a company to own and sell its own stock. Think about it. When there is a stock buy-back funded by excess profits, where does that stock go?" "Institutions may be buying large quantities of the stock and would want the price to go up after they are done buying all that they have to buy.  If the price jumps before they finish buying then they may not make as great a deal as they would otherwise.  Consider buying tens of thousands of shares of a company and then how does one promote that?  Also, what kind of PR system should those investment companies have to disclose whether or not they have holdings in these companies.  This is just some of the stuff you may be missing here. The ""Wall street analysts"" are the investment banks that want the companies to do business through them and thus it is a win/win relationship as the bank gets some fees for all the transactions done for the company while the company gets another cheerleader to try to play up the stock." It depends. If the investor bought newly-issued shares or treasury shares, the company gets the money. If the investor bought shares already held by the owner, the owner gets the money. A 100% owner can decide how to structure the sale. Yet, the investor may only be willing to buy shares if the funds increase the company's working capital. The holders of the shares have to agree to sell them to management in a share repurchase.  Typically, share repurchases are done in the open market, causing market activity to increase the share price marginally.  This is how the company returns the value to shareholders.  The company could also negotiate a price with a mutual fund, or founder, for a large block.     If they get close to the point of purchasing all outstanding shares, this would be exactly the same as the management of the company taking the company private, buying out all existing shareholders.   To prevent a single holdout from keeping say the very last share for one million dollars or the like on the open market, they would generally propose to the board of directors the buyout terms with a price per share, and most corporate charters are written such that the directors' vote binds minority shareholders to buyout or merger decisions.  Michael Dell famously took Dell Computer private in 2013, raising external money to offer a fair price to the board, which accepted it, letting him take it back to private status. This really comes down to tax structuring (which I am not an expert on), for public companies the acquiror almost always pays for the cash to prevent any taxable drawdown of overseas accounts, dividend taxes suck, etc.  For a private company, first the debt gets swept, then special dividend out - dividends received by the selling corporate entity benefit from a tax credit plus it reduces the selling price of the equity, reducing capital gains taxes. It looks like JP Morgan can convert your holding to unsponsored ADRs until July.. In any event, you should not completely lose the equity. Volvo still exists as a public company, it's just not tradable on US exchanges. Q1: Yes, you'd need a JPM account.  Your broker should have offered a similar service. If they didn't they are not a broker. Q2: You own 30 shares in Volvo. You need to get your broker to either sell them (off-exchange now) or tell you how to gain access to them. "This is a great question.  I've participated in a deal like that as an employee, and I also know of friends and family who have been involved during a buyout.  In short:  The updated part of your question is correct: There is no single typical treatment.  What happens to unvested restricted stock units (RSUs), unvested employee stock options, etc. varies from case to case. Furthermore, what exactly will happen in your case ought to have been described in the grant documentation which you (hopefully) received when you were issued restricted stock in the first place. Anyway, here are the two cases I've seen happen before: Immediate vesting of all units.  Immediate vesting is often the case with RSUs or options that are granted to executives or key employees.  The grant documentation usually details the cases that will have immediate vesting.  One of the cases is usually a Change in/of Control (CIC or COC) provision, triggered in a buyout.  Other immediate vesting cases may be when the key employee is terminated without cause, or dies.  The terms vary, and are often negotiated by shrewd key employees. Conversion of the units to a new schedule.  If anything is more ""typical"" of regular employee-level grants, I think this one would be.  Generally, such RSU or option grants will be converted, at the deal price, to a new schedule with identical dates and vesting percentages, but a new number of units and dollar amount or strike price, usually so the end result would have been the same as before the deal. I'm also curious if anybody else has been through a buyout, or knows anybody who has been through a buyout, and how they were treated." Companies need to go public before you can buy their shares on a public stock exchange, but all companies have shares, even if there's only one share. And anyone who owns those shares can give them to whoever they like (there are generally restrictions on selling shares in unlisted companies to unsophisticated investors, but not on giving them away). Suppose I purchase $10,000 worth of a particular share today. If the person(s) I am purchasing the shares from paid $9,000 for those shares, then I replacing their $9,000 investment with my $10,000 investment.  This is a net inflow of $1,000 into the market. Similarly, if the person(s) I am purchasing the shares from paid $11,000 for those shares, then their $11,000 investment is being replace by my $10,000 investment.  This is a net outflow of $1,000 out of the market. The aggregate of all such inflows and outflows in the net inflow/outflow into the market over a given period of time.  (Here we are ignoring the effects of new share issues.) Regardless of whether a stock is owned by a retail investor or an institutional investor, it is subject to the same rules.  For example, say that as part of the buyout, 1 share of Company B is equivalent to 0.75 shares of Company A and any fractional shares will be paid out in cash.  This rule will apply to both the retail investor who holds 500 shares of Company B, as well as the asset manager or hedge fund holding 5,000,000 shares of Company B. Typically a private company is hit by demand supply issues and cost of inputs. In effect at times the cost of input may go up, it cannot raise the prices, because this will reduce demand. However certain public sectors companies, typically in Oil & Engery segements the services are offered by Public sector companies, and the price they charge is governed by Regulatory authorities. In essence the PG&E, the agreement for price to customers would be calculated as cost of inputs to PG&E, Plus Expenses Plus 11.35% Profit. Thus the regulated price itself governs that the company makes atleast 11.35% profit year on year. Does this mean that the shares are good buy?  Just to give an example, say the price was $100 at face value, So essentially by year end logically you would have made 111.35/-. Assuming the company did not pay dividend ... Now lets say you began trading this share, there would be quite a few people who would say I am ready to pay $200 and even if I get 11.35 [on 200] it still means I have got ~6% return. Someone may be ready to pay $400, it still gives ~3% ... So in short the price of the stock would keep changing depending how the market percieves the value that a company would return. If the markets are down or the sentiments are down on energy sectors, the prices would go down.  So investing in PG&E is not a sure shot way of making money. For actual returns over the years see the graph at http://www.pgecorp.com/investors/financial_reports/annual_report_proxy_statement/ar_html/2011/index.htm#CS "I'm not the OP, but I'm happy to give a brief overview.  Basically, pre-JOBS act there were a lot of limits on who could make an equity investment in a non-public company (i.e. a startup or even a hedge fund). There were some loopholes, but basically you had to be an 'accredited investor'. An accredited investor was someone who either has made $200,000+ ($300,000+ for married people) for the past two years and expects to make that much again in the current year. Alternately, they could have a net worth of $1 million, excluding the value of their primary residence. There was also a limit of 500 investors for a non-public company before the company had to become public (they didn't really have to IPO, but they did have to file their financials with the SEC, so the effect was basically the same). Finally, non-public companies were prohibited from seeking investment through advertising basically. They couldn't take out an ad in a paper or event send a mass email and say, ""Hey, we're looking to raise a $1 million funding round, contact us if you're interested!""  Okay, now after the JOBS Act.  The JOBS Act changed a) the number and type of investors who could make equity investments in a non-public company b) the regulation of advertising for investments.  Post-JOBS private companies could have 2,000 shareholders and 500 of those could be unaccredited (e.g. regular people like you and I). The change in the number of shareholders isn't really that important because it's just shareholders of record, but that's another post for another day. There are still some requirements for unaccredited shareholder, which I don't remember off the top of my head. I think you have to have income of at least $40k. They also changed the solicitation ban, so it's possible that you might see an ad in the WSJ someday for a startup company, venture capital fund, hedge fund, etc.  There are some other things it changed, but IMO those are the two most important." "Going private does not mean that the company buys its own shares, only that the freely traded shares are bought up by a private entity (this can be management =&gt; ""management buy-out"" or it can be a private investor). The stock is then not traded publicly and the company gets rid of a whole slew of compliance obligations.   In your stated example the company would essentially convert all its stock to treasury stock, which does not pay dividends and has no voting rights. From what I gather from some googling this would actually imply that the company would liquidate itself since it now has no capital anymore. Not sure on this though, an accountant might be able to help here..." Public companies sometimes buy up all their shares in order to go private^(1).  Is that the sort of thing you're talking about?  If so, [this article](http://www.investopedia.com/articles/stocks/08/public-companies-privatize-go-private.asp) might be of interest to you.  ^(1) Actually, most of the time, they partner with private equity firms to do it, but I think the effect is essentially what you're describing. The Employee Benefits Security Administration within the US Department of Labor is tasked with keeping track of pension and 401K programs. The even have a website to search for abandoned plans: it helps participants and others find out whether a particular plan is in the process of being, or has been, terminated and the name of the Qualified Termination Administrator (QTA) responsible for the termination.  The Employee Benefits Security Administration discuss all types of details regarding retirement programs. This document What You Should Know About Your Retirement Plan has a lot of details including this: If your former employer has gone out of business, arrangements should   have been made so a plan official remains responsible for the payment   of benefits and other plan business. If you are entitled to benefits   and are unable to contact the plan administrator, contact EBSA   electronically at askebsa.dol.gov or by calling toll free at   1-866-444-3272. There are also EBSA offices spread thought the United States