

#Irc 212 code#

Any employee who served as the CEO or CFO at any time during the year is a Covered Employee and an employee does not need to be employed by the company at year-end to qualify as a Covered Employee (unlike pre-TCJA days). Under Section 162(m) as amended, Covered Employees include the CEO, CFO and three other most highly compensated executive officers of a public company. The TCJA significantly expanded the scope of individuals covered by Section 162(m). The final regulations eliminate this transition relief for corporations that became publicly-traded after December 20, 2019.

Compensation paid under arrangements that pre-dated the corporation’s initial public offering (IPO) and were disclosed to prospective shareholders was exempt from Section 162(m)’s deduction limitation for a limited period following an IPO. Prior to the TCJA, special transition relief was available to newly public corporations. Relief for New Public Corporations Eliminated. The final regulations provide further details and clarification. However, the TCJA includes an important transition rule under which the changes made to Section 162(m) do not apply to certain “grandfathered” arrangements. The TCJA eliminated this exemption for performance-based compensation and expanded the scope of entities and individuals covered by Section 162(m). Prior to the TCJA, payments of qualified performance-based compensation made to covered employees were exempt from the $1 million annual limitation. Section 162(m) generally disallows a tax deduction for compensation paid in excess of $1 million in any taxable year to certain current and former executive officers (“Covered Employees”) of publicly held corporations.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently published final regulations implementing changes made by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) to Section 162(m) of the Internal Revenue Code (Section 162(m)) expanding the scope of Section 162(m)’s compensation tax deduction limitation. Publicly held companies that already exceed or that may soon exceed the Section 162(m) $1 million deduction limit will need to carefully consider the impact of amended Section 162(m).
