Knight Ridder Eases K Plan Stock Rules

A news release from the San Jose, California-based company said the changes, which went into effect at the beginning of the month, give employees more flexibility to buy and/or sell company stock and better diversify their plan accounts.

The changes include:

• allowing employees who receive company contributions invested in Knight Ridder stock to sell some or all of that stock and invest the proceeds in the Vanguard Group funds available under the plan. Employees also will be able to sell some or all of the Vanguard funds and invest the proceeds in the Knight Ridder Common Stock Fund. For most employees, any company contributions will continue to be invested initially in Knight Ridder common stock with participants getting to choose how to handle any additional shares after that.
• allowing participants to have Knight Ridder common stock as an investment option for their own contributions. Employees can direct the investment of their contributions and their existing account balances into any combination of Vanguard investment funds and Knight Ridder common stock, according to the announcement.