Chemours has suspended its top executives pending an internal audit related to ethics-hotline reports, certain Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings and bookkeeping practices that may have impacted incentive plans.
Chemours said Feb. 28 that its board of directors placed CEO Mark Newman, CFO Jonathan Lock and accounting officer Camela Wisel on administrative leave.
The board appointed Denise Dignam as the interim CEO and Matt Abbott as the interim CFO and accounting officer.
Due to the investigation, the company delayed its fourth-quarter and full-year financial report.
The company expects to report a net loss of $225 million to $235 million, compared to net income of $578 million last year. The estimated net loss includes $746 million of pre-tax litigation settlements and $153 million of restructuring, asset-related and other charges, offset by a $106 million net pre-tax gain associated with the 2023 sale of the glycolic acid business.
Dignam joined Chemours in 2015 and has served as president of the Titanium Technologies division since March 2023. Abbott has served as Chemours’ chief enterprise transformation officer since June 2023.
In mid-December, the SEC questioned Chemours about several non-GAAP measures in its filings, including those that impacted executives’ incentive pay, according to a Wall Street Journal article.
The Journal noted that these type of non-GAAP adjustments have come under criticism by executive-pay critics because they’re prone to manipulation.