Under a new rule proposed by the SEC, senior executives that publish faulty financial statements would have to give back some of their compensation as punishment for the accounting missteps. Presently, an executive may get to keep a bonus even if the company artificially inflated financial metrics and then corrected the missteps by issuing new financial statements. The new rule would enable a company to "claw back" incentive-based compensation (which has grown consistently larger in recent years) when financials have been restated.
Seeking Alpha