Photo of James Earle

James Earle

Subscribe to James Earle's Posts

Jim counsels publicly traded companies and other complex employers on matters related to executive compensation. His clients operate globally in a wide range of industries, including financial services, manufacturing, food, telecommunications, utilities and other service-based companies. Jim advises clients on all aspects of the employment, compensation, benefits and severance of directors, executive officers and other senior managers. He has significant substantive experience with all forms of executive compensation and benefit plans.

Follow:Read more about James EarleJames's Linkedin Profile

Last May, we provided a client alert about a recent federal district court case (Spence v. American Airlines, No. 4:23-cv-00552-O, 2025 WL 225127, at *2 (N.D. Tex. Jan. 10, 2025)), in which a plan sponsor and certain plan fiduciaries were found to have breached their ERISA fiduciary duty of loyalty based primarily on conduct related to proxy voting of securities held in certain of the 401(k) plans’ investment funds. At that time, the court left open the question of whether the breach resulted in any damages to the participants.

Introduction

On July 4, 2025, H.R. 1 — the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (the OBBBA) was enacted into law. OBBBA introduces significant amendments to the Internal Revenue Code (IRC), including notable changes to sections 162(m) and 4960.[1] Section 162(m) limits the deductibility of executive compensation for publicly held corporations, and section 4960 imposes excise taxes on excess compensation and excess parachute payments paid by certain tax-exempt organizations. These measures serve to raise tax revenue from executive compensation as a partial offset to tax costs elsewhere in OBBBA. This article summarizes the key statutory changes made to sections 162(m) and 4960 by OBBBA and discusses practical implications for affected organizations.

On September 9, 2025, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued Advisory Opinion 2025-03A addressing the following question: Are awards of restricted stock units (RSUs) that permit post-employment vesting considered a “pension plan” subject to the requirements of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA)? For the reasons discussed below, the DOL answered, no, the RSUs are not subject to ERISA.

On May 6, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) issued a notice of proposed rulemaking and request for public comment to implement Section 956 of the Dodd-Frank and Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank). Under Section 956, the FDIC, OCC, FHFA, National Credit Union Association (NCUA), Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (the Fed) are tasked with jointly prescribing regulations that (1) prohibit incentive-based compensation at covered financial institutions that encourages inappropriate risk-taking because it is excessive or could lead to material financial loss, and (2) require the disclosure of information concerning these compensation arrangements to the appropriate federal regulator.

A board of directors of a Delaware company may delegate its authority to grant equity awards if certain requirements enumerated in the Delaware General Corporation Law (DGCL) are met. Effective August 1, 2023, updates were made to these DGCL requirements.

Under §§ 157(c) and 152(b) of the DGCL, a board must establish the delegation through…