Contributions are sent to Fidelity as soon as practicable following each payroll period, and are invested by Fidelity in the funds as specified by participants. Monies will be held and invested by Fidelity in a BlackRock Lifepath Index Fund closest to the employee’s 65th birthday (the default investment option) until designated investments have been elected by the participant.
All contributions are considered tax deferred under section 401(a) of the IRC, with the exception of Roth elective deferrals, which are made on an after-tax basis.
The Plan has a Traditional option which covers employees with hire dates before November 1, 1996 except for those employees who opted into the Contemporary option described below. Under this option, participant and Company contributions are calculated as previously described and participants are fully vested in their account balance at all times.
The Plan has a Contemporary option which generally covers employees with hire dates on or after November 1, 1996 and existing employees at January 1, 1997 that selected this option. Under this option, participants receive a higher matching contribution from the Company than participants in the Traditional option. In the Contemporary option, the Company match is three times greater for the first two percent of participant contributions than the next four percent. The matching contribution for the Contemporary option does not vest until the participant has completed their third year of service.
Participant Accounts – Individual accounts are maintained for each Plan participant. Each participant’s account is credited with the participant’s contributions, employer matching contributions, Plan earnings/losses (based on each participant’s investment elections), and charged with withdrawals and administrative expenses. Participants are immediately vested in their contributions and allocated earnings or losses. The benefit to which a participant is entitled is one that can be provided from the participant’s vested account balance.
Forfeited Accounts – At October 31, 2020 and 2019, forfeited nonvested accounts totaled $318 thousand and $440 thousand, respectively. These accounts will be used to reduce future Company contributions. During the year ended October 31, 2020, Company contributions were reduced by $1,414 thousand from forfeited nonvested accounts.
Fund Elections – Participants in the Plan direct the investment of their account balances into one or more investment funds, which include the following as of October 31, 2020:
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Wells Fargo Core Plus Bond Fund
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Deere & Company Common Stock Fund*
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Any of 23 Common Collective Trust Funds
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*Participants may not invest more than 20% of their future contributions in the Deere & Company Common Stock Fund or make an exchange into the Deere & Company Stock Fund that would result in the participant’s Deere & Company Stock Fund holdings exceeding 20% after the exchange.
In addition, participants have access to Fidelity BrokerageLink, which is a self-directed brokerage account. Through this account, a participant has access to over 3,000 open-ended mutual funds from a variety of fund families.
The Plan includes an Employee Stock Ownership Plan and dividend payout feature whereby participants may elect to receive dividends on their vested shares of Company common stock in the