diff --git a/CHANGES b/CHANGES
index df0bf2a..4dcb9c8 100644
--- a/CHANGES
+++ b/CHANGES
@@ -12,6 +12,10 @@ corrections:
 	EXEC and SYSTEM with stderr injected socat messages into the data
 	stream. test: EXECSTDERRLOG
 
+	when the EXEC address got a string with consecutive spaces it created
+	additional empty arguments (thanks to Olivier Hervieu for reporting
+	this bug)
+
 ####################### V 1.6.0.1:
 
 new features:
diff --git a/VERSION b/VERSION
index bb1254e..6d51c99 100644
--- a/VERSION
+++ b/VERSION
@@ -1 +1 @@
-"1.6.0.1+ip4bind+recvfromfork+x64+execstderr"
+"1.6.0.1+ip4bind+recvfromfork+x64+execstderr+execspaces"
diff --git a/test.sh b/test.sh
index 60ba633..29d5359 100755
--- a/test.sh
+++ b/test.sh
@@ -8261,6 +8261,41 @@ PORT=$((PORT+1))
 N=$((N+1))
 
 
+# there was a bug in parsing the arguments of exec: consecutive spaces resulted
+# in additional empty arguments
+NAME=EXECSPACES
+case "$TESTS" in
+*%functions%*|*%exec%*|*%parse%*|*%$NAME%*)
+TEST="$NAME: correctly parse exec with consecutive spaces"
+$PRINTF "test $F_n $TEST... " $N
+tf="$td/test$N.stdout"
+te="$td/test$N.stderr"
+da="test$N $(date) $RANDOM"
+tdiff="$td/test$N.diff"
+# put the test data as first argument after two spaces. expect the data in the
+# first argument of the exec'd command.
+$SOCAT $opts -u "exec:\"bash -c \\\"echo \$1\\\"  \\\"\\\" \\\"$da\\\"\"" - >"$tf" 2>"$te"
+rc=$?
+echo "$da" |diff - "$tf" >"$tdiff"
+if [ "$rc" -ne 0 ]; then
+    $PRINTF "$FAILED: $SOCAT:\n"
+    cat "$te"
+    numFAIL=$((numFAIL+1))
+elif [ -s "$tdiff" ]; then
+    $PRINTF "$FAILED: $SOCAT:\n"
+    echo diff:
+    cat "$tdiff"
+    if [ -n "$debug" ]; then cat $te; fi
+    numFAIL=$((numFAIL+1))
+else
+    $PRINTF "$OK\n"
+    if [ -n "$debug" ]; then cat $te; fi
+    numOK=$((numOK+1))
+fi
+esac
+N=$((N+1))
+
+
 echo "summary: $((N-1)) tests; $numOK ok, $numFAIL failed, $numCANT could not be performed"
 
 if [ "$numFAIL" -gt 0 ]; then
diff --git a/xio-exec.c b/xio-exec.c
index 0e2f09d..7a6958c 100644
--- a/xio-exec.c
+++ b/xio-exec.c
@@ -83,11 +83,11 @@ static int xioopen_exec(int argc, const char *argv[], struct opt *opts,
       if (pargv[0] == NULL)  pargv[0] = token;  else  ++pargv[0];
       pargc = 1;
       while (*strp == ' ') {
+	 while (*++strp == ' ')  ;
 	 if ((pargc & 0x07) == 0) {
 	    pargv = Realloc(pargv, (pargc+8)*sizeof(char *));
 	    if (pargv == NULL)  return STAT_RETRYLATER;
 	 }
-	 ++strp;
 	 pargv[pargc++] = tokp;
 	 if (nestlex(&strp, &tokp, &len, ends, hquotes, squotes, nests,
 		     true, true, false) < 0) {