May 15, 2007

Errata: Example of ESOP Diversification in Last Newsletter Issue Incorrect

NCEO founder and senior staff member

In the last issue of the newsletter, our math was wrong in the example of how to diversify in an ESOP. In the second bullet point in the example, the text should read "So now the calculation is 25% of 1,100 shares, or 275 shares eligible to be diversified. But 250 were already diversified, so it is 25 shares more that can be diversified." To review, the rule is that in the years after the first year of diversification, you take all the shares that have ever been allocated to an employee's account (or acquired after 1986 for some plans), multiply by 0.25, then subtract the number of shares already diversified. We apologize for the error.