Back in 2010, Diamond Foods, Inc. completed its acquisition of Kettle Foods, a premium potato chip manufacturer. Diamond paid approximately $616 million for Kettle Foods and $235 million, or nearly 40%, of the purchase price was allocated to “brand intangibles”. Such a high value leads to the question: How are such valuations determined and what are the drivers?
On July 1, the SEC proposed new rules to require public companies to clawback certain types of incentive-based executive compensation if the award was improperly given due to accounting misstatements. For example, if an executive received a bonus based on the company achieving a revenue target and it is subsequently determined that revenue was misstated, the bonus would be subject to clawback.
Mercer Capital, a national business valuation and financial advisory firm specializing in Corporate Valuation, Litigation Support, Financial Reporting Valuation, and Transaction Advisory Consulting, and Erickson Partners, Inc., a Texas-based Valuation and Litigation Support firm, announce their merger effective July 1, 2015.
On May 20, 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed new rules and amendments to modernize and enhance information reported by investment companies and investment advisers. The proposed rules would be applicable to most investment companies registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940 and all investment advisers registered under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940.
Section 409A applies to all companies offering nonqualified deferred compensation plans to employees. We are not attorneys, so we will leave the legal minutiae of that definition for others to grapple with, noting only that generally speaking, a deferred compensation plan is an arrangement whereby an employee (“service provider” in 409A parlance) receives compensation in a later tax year than that in which the compensation was earned. “Nonqualified” plans exclude 401(k) and other “qualified” plans.
