June 20, 2024 - When is a board of directors permitted to withhold information from one of its members? Although the Canadian corporate statutes generally grant directors a blanket right to inspect board and committee minutes, there is uncertainty as to whether a board could nonetheless withhold from a director...
Executive Decisions: Compensation Trends In and Outside of Times of Crisis
Chapter 6 of Davies Governance Insights 2020
The reasonableness of executive compensation arrangements has long been a contentious issue. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated pre-existing trends and introduced new challenges, including increased concerns about the widening pay gap between executives and the average Canadian employee, as well as demands for greater proportionality of outcomes for issuers’ various stakeholders. In this chapter, we explore the ways public issuers in Canada and the United States have adjusted their compensation structures in response to unanticipated disruptions. We also provide guidance for boards and compensation committees considering recalibrating their compensation plans. Finally, we discuss the pandemic’s impact on both current year and future say-on-pay votes and some renewed calls for mandatory pay ratio disclosure in Canada.
This chapter appears in the 2020 edition of Davies Governance Insights, our comprehensive annual report on the trends and issues most important to Canadian public companies.
Key Contacts
Related
June 19, 2024 - The new policy provides for increased flexibility in the assessment of a supplier’s conduct, but targets a much broader range of situations triggering ineligibility Introduction The Government of Canada recently updated its “Ineligibility and Suspension Policy” (Policy). ...