Meeting Requirements for Fiduciary Responsibility
An ESOP fiduciary is required to act in the best interests of the plan participants. The requirements include specific rules as well as best practices relating to corporate governance and the administration of the ESOP.
The trustee of the ESOP trust is a plan fiduciary who must fulfill specific rules, including oversight of the valuation of the stock in the ESOP. The ESOP trustee may be an institutional trustee or may be an individual person, either a person who is independent from the company or who has another role at the company, such as an executive officer.
At SES ESOP Strategies, we can help ESOP fiduciaries understand their responsibilities. We can also provide guidance on the ways fiduciaries fulfill their obligations and understand their relationship to other constituents in the ESOP transaction. Through our affiliated multidisciplinary professional services platform, Stevens & Lee, we can also serve as counsel to the trustee or other fiduciary.