Category: Executive Compensation

Senate bill introduced to raise Rule 701 disclosure threshold

by Cydney Posner Senators Pat Toomey (R., PA) and Mark Warner (D., VA) have introduced Senate Bill 576, the ‘‘Encouraging Employee Ownership Act.’’  The bill would require the SEC, within 60 days after enactment, to raise the threshold in Section (e) of Rule 701, the exemption from registration for privately held […]

Survey: institutional investors want return of 25-page proxy statements

by Cydney Posner Let’s reconsider: is it really necessary – or even useful – to have a proxy statement for an ordinary annual meeting that exceeds 100 pages in length?  Does responsibility for bloated proxy statements lie with legislators and regulators or must we practitioners (and may I include comp […]

Will the new revenue recognition standard wreak havoc on existing executive compensation arrangements?

by Cydney Posner Compliance Week reports on the “tectonic shift” anticipated to result from implementation of FASB’s new revenue recognition standard and the impact of that shift on executive pay. The new standard is scheduled to go into effect at the beginning of 2017; however, companies that include revenue goals […]

Companies take clawbacks into their own hands — ouch, is it always a good thing?

by Cydney Posner As Compliance Week reports, this study from PwC showed that many companies are adopting clawbacks related to their executive compensation arrangements, even before the SEC acts to implement the Dodd-Frank clawback provisions.  The PwC study looked at 100 large public companies and found that 40% had made […]

SEC issues proposal for hedging policy disclosure; Commissioners add some drama to otherwise humdrum rule proposal

by Cydney Posner This morning, the SEC posted proposed amendments to rules to implement Section 955 of Dodd-Frank, which requires, in proxy statements for annual meetings, disclosure of whether employees or directors are permitted to hedge equity securities of the company. (Apparently, the SEC voted to issue the proposal without the […]

How many hours does it take to create pay-ratio rules?

by Cydney Posner The WSJ is reporting that the SEC staff has spent an aggregate of 7,196 hours since 2011 working on the development of the still-in-the-proposal-stage pay-ratio disclosure rules required under Dodd-Frank.  According to a letter from SEC Chair Mary Jo White to the House Financial Services Committee, that […]

Are we aligning pay to the wrong performance metrics?

by Cydney Posner As discussed in this article in Compliance Week, this report, “The Alignment Gap Between Creating Value, Performance Measurement, and Long-Term Incentive Design,” by Organizational Capital Partners and the Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute, contends that most companies are using the wrong metrics to align executive pay with performance.  Rather […]