General Meeting of Shareholders
- Approval of a gross dividend of € 1.10
- Approval of the proposed appointments
Today Bekaert's Annual General Meeting of Shareholders took place, with Mr Bert De Graeve, Chairman of the Board of Directors, in the chair. The following main subjects were considered.
The meeting approved the balance sheet and the income statement as at 31 December 2017, as submitted by the Board of Directors, including the distribution of a gross dividend of € 1.10 per share.
The dividend ex-date is 11 May 2018. The dividend will be payable on 15 May 2018 by the following banks: ING Belgium, Bank Degroof Petercam, BNP Paribas Fortis, KBC Bank and Belfius Bank in Belgium, Société Générale in France, ABN-AMRO Bank in the Netherlands and UBS in Switzerland.
The meeting acknowledged the 2017 annual report of the Board of Directors, and approved the remuneration report for the year 2017. The meeting discharged the Directors and the Statutory Auditor for the performance of their duties during the financial year 2017 and approved the remuneration of the Directors and the Statutory Auditor.
The meeting accepted the recommendations:
- to appoint Mr Colin Smith as independent Director for a term of four years, until the Annual General Meeting to be held in 2022;
- to re-appoint Mr Matthew Taylor as Director for a term of four years, until the Annual General Meeting to be held in 2022;
- to re-appoint Ms Mei Ye as independent Director for a term of four years, until the Annual General Meeting to be held in 2022.
Related press release: 28 February 2018: Nomination of new Director
The meeting approved a number of change of control provisions, the NV Bekaert SA Share Option Plan 2018-2020 and the NV Bekaert SA Performance Share Plan 2018-2020.
Today an Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders took place as well. The meeting extended the authorization granted to the Board of Directors to increase the registered capital (authorized capital). The meeting did not reach the qualified majority required to extend the authorization granted to the Board to buy back company shares.