New Clawback Rules Don’t Cover Out-of-Period Changes, SEC Says

Companies that make small, out-of-period adjustments to their financial statements don’t need to worry about Securities and Exchange Commission rules requiring them to force executives to return their bonuses, an SEC top accountant said Tuesday.

“I know there’s a lot of confusion out there,” said Lindsay McCord, chief accountant in the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance, at an American Institute of CPAs conference in Washington. “Some people are asking or assuming that out-of-period adjustments are part of check box one. They are not.”

The SEC rules, approved ...