HIGH BAR

It is not uncommon for bankrupt firms to gucci bags try to retain key executives by offering bonuses tied to performance that increases value for creditors. But pay issues are prickly in the case of MF Global, whose commodities customers are missing an estimated $1.6 billion that investigators say was improperly removed from their accounts in the days leading up to the company's downfall. HIGH BAR In any case, Freeh may have to meet a high legal bar under a set of 2005 amendments to bankruptcy laws that govern executive bonuses. One section of the law requires a showing that an employee is essential to the company's operation - a tough argument in the case of MF Global, black gucci belt which is not really an operating company, said Peter Morgenstern, a bankruptcy partner at law firm Butzel Long. "The company is dead," said Morgenstern, who is not involved in the case. Another part of the law requires a showing that an employee has another job offer on the table and needs to be incentivized not to take it. But creative lawyers have been able to get around those rules by tying the bonuses to performance incentives, said David Skeel, a bankruptcy expert and professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. "What the provision prohibits is pay-to-stay," Skeel said. "It doesn't say you can't have performance-based incentives. That's still not quite gucci shirts for men and women outlet squared with the spirit of the provision, but that's what's been done."