VF Corp., Greenwood Village, Colo., paid $130 million in lump sums to former employees in its U.S. defined benefit plan who have yet to retire, company spokesman Colin Wheeler said in an email.
In December, about 2,400 former employees — about 40% of those to whom VF made the offer — received the lump sums, which represented $170 million in projected benefit obligations related to those participants, the filing said.
It is the second lump-sum offer to be made to former employees in the past four years.
In 2016, about 9,400 former employees accepted lump sums, representing about 66% of those who received the offer. The company paid a total of $197 million in lump sums to those former employees, representing $225 million in projected benefit obligations.
The company froze benefit accruals to the U.S. defined benefit plan as of Dec. 31, 2018.
Mr. Wheeler declined to comment whether VF Corp. expects any further pension risk transfer transactions in the future.
As of March 31, 2019, VF Corp.’s U.S. defined benefit plan assets totaled $1.751 billion, while projected benefit obligations totaled $1.819 billion, for a funding ratio of 96.3%, according to the company’s most recent 10-K filing.
