Possible Elimination of Corporate Officer Restriction on French-Qualified Awards - 16 Jan 2009

Possible Elimination of Corporate Officer Restriction on French-Qualified Awards

If
you grant French-qualified options and/or RSUs, you are probably aware
of the additional restrictions applicable to your French corporate
officers. These restrictions were introduced on January 1, 2007 and
provide that, for French-qualified awards made to certain corporate
officers (this is a term of art - please see our prior alerts on this subject) of a
French entity, a set percentage of the shares subject to the
French-qualified options or RSUs must be held by the corporate officers
until such time as the officers cease to serve as corporate officers. This holding period restriction is in addition to
the normal holding periods required for French-qualified options and
French-qualified RSUs. The only reprieve from this additional
restriction applied to French entities which are organized as a SARL (societe a responsabilite limitee), since such entities would not have any of the officers subject to the restriction.

In an instance
of good news in France, the French tax authorities issued new
administrative guidelines on January 5, 2009 which provide that the corporate officer restrictions shall not apply to French-qualified options granted to

more...http://bakerxchange.com/ve/ZZM3059tt66M6385bM28