Annual General Meeting of Ratos AB - Proposed dividend is withdrawn

Regulatory Information 2020-03-30

This information is information that Ratos AB (publ) is obliged to make public pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation. The information was submitted for publication, through the agency of the contact persons set out below, at 9:00 p.m. CET on 30 March 2020.

To better understand the consequences of the corona pandemic, Ratos's Board of Directors proposes that the Annual General Meeting, which takes place on April 1, does not decide to resolve on a dividend. Instead, the Board intends to call the shareholders to an Extraordinary General Meeting later in the year to resolve on a dividend, if the market has stabilized at this time and the company's visibility in earnings has normalized. The Board has also decided to adjust the proposal to the Annual General Meeting on long-term incentive program 2020/2025 in accordance with below.

The Board's previous assessment of the proposed level of dividend to the shareholders remains. However, considering the current market instability and uncertainty factors about COVID-19's medium-term financial effects, the Board of Directors has today decided, for reasons of caution, to withdraw its revised proposal for a dividend of SEK 0.30 per share and instead propose that the Annual General Meeting decides not to pay any dividend. 

The Board instead intends to call the shareholders to an Extraordinary General Meeting later in the year to decide on a dividend, if the market at this time has stabilized and the company's visibility for the result has normalized.

The Board of Directors has also decided to adjust the proposal for the Annual General Meeting 2020 regarding the long-term incentive program 2020/2025. It is proposed that the warrants will be issued for market consideration (and not free of charge as stated in the Board's previous proposal). The change means that the issue of the warrants does not entail costs for the company in terms of benefit value of the warrants at allocation or in the form of social security contributions. The updated proposal for the Annual General Meeting 2020 on a long-term incentive program 2020/2025, which contains these changes, is available on Ratos's website, www.ratos.se.

 

For further information:

Jonas Wiström, CEO Ratos, tel: +46 8 700 17 00
Helene Gustafsson, Head of IR- and Press Ratos, tel: +46 70 868 40 50, email: helene.gustafsson@ratos.se

About Ratos:
Ratos is a business group consisting of 12 companies divided into three business areas: Consumer & Technology, Construction & Services and Industry. In total, the companies have SEK 38 billion in sales and EBITA of SEK 1.8 billion. Our business concept is to develop mid-sized companies headquartered in the Nordics that are or can become market leaders. We enable independent mid-sized companies to excel by being part of something larger. People, leadership, culture and values are key focus areas for Ratos. Everything we do is based on Ratos’s core values: Simplicity, Speed in Execution and It’s All About People.