Company: MFAN
Filing Date: 2025-04-18
Form Type: DEF 14A
Source: 0001140361-25-014577
Chunk: 67

Company: MFA FINANCIAL, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-04-18
Form: DEF 14A
Chunk 67
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 regarding the key terms of employment, including the employment term, level of base salary, other elements of compensation, reasons for termination of employment before the end of the term, severance payments and post-employment covenants. At present, we have written employment agreements with two executive officers (Mr. Knutson and Mr. Wulfsohn). The Compensation Committee believes that the use of employment agreements in certain instances helps the Company to retain key personnel responsible for the execution of MFA’s strategies and the management of its operations and provides certain protections for MFA in the form of covenants restricting employment with a competitor and solicitation of our employees. Although the Compensation Committee has used written employment agreements to provide the Company and certain of its executives with certainty regarding the terms of employment and to encourage stability of key management, the Compensation Committee periodically discusses their merit in achieving these objectives and may, in its discretion, determine not to use written employment agreements in the future for certain or all of our employees. For additional details regarding the employment agreements of Mr. Knutson and Mr. Wulfsohn, including the circumstances in which severance is payable and the amount of such severance benefits, see “Employment Contracts” on pages 62to 66and “Potential Payments upon Termination of Employment or Change in Control” on pages 66to 70of this Proxy Statement. The Compensation Committee believes that the written employment agreements have been responsibly structured, including as follows:

| • | Employment terms are renewable and may otherwise be terminated on an annual basis; |

| • | Severance arrangements individually tailored for each executive depending on his role and for the applicable termination scenario; |

| MFA Financial, Inc. | 51 | 2025 Proxy Statement |

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| • | No “single trigger” or “modified single trigger” vesting of severance benefits and/or outstanding equity awards upon a change in control of the Company; |

| • | No tax gross-up payments; and |

| • | Incentive compensation subject to Company clawback policy, which is discussed below. |

Clawback Policy . The Company’s clawback policy provides for the recovery of certain performance-based compensation in the event of an accounting restatement (as such term is defined in the clawback policy) by the Company due to material noncompliance with any financial reporting requirement under U.S. federal securities laws, including any required accounting restatement to correct an error in previously issued financial statements (i) that is material to the previously