Kmart 'loans' cause concern, some say action was necessary.(Brief Article)

"A company's not a bank," said Charles Elson, director of the Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware. His comments came after Kmart disclosed this week that it gave more than $30 million in retention and relocation loans to senior management in the months leading up to its bankruptcy filing on Jan 22. Included in that figure was more than $18 million in loans to nine top executives, all of whom are no longer employed by the company. In the 10,000-page filing, Kmart revealed that it had issued the loans in an effort to halt the revolving door in its executive offices. If the loans are forgiven, Elson said, it would make them appear as "a form of phantom …