Clariant shareholders approve all agenda items
- Dividend payment resumed at CHF 0.30 per share through reduction of par value
- Waiving of voting rights limit of 10 percent of share capital
- Clariant re-affirms Group outlook 2012
- Rudolf Wehrli succeeds Jürg Witmer as Chairman of the Board of Directors
Muttenz, 27 March 2012 – The Annual General Meeting of Clariant AG, a world leader in specialty chemicals, took place on 27 March 2012 in Basel and approved all agenda items. It was attended by 560 shareholders or proxies, representing 132'215'758 shares or 44.7% of Clariant’s total share capital.
The AGM approved the annual report and annual accounts for 2011 with 99.9 percent of votes, discharged the corporate bodies of the company with 98.1 percent of votes, and voted for the allocation of the available net profit to the free reserves with 99.8 percent. With 76.8 percent of votes, it also approved on a consultative basis the company’s compensation policy.
With 99.7 percent of votes, the General Meeting followed the Board of Director’s proposal to repay the par value of CHF 0.30 per registered share, instead of distributing an ordinary dividend. The share capital will therefore be reduced as well as the par value of each registered share by CHF 0.30 to CHF 3.70.
With 65.6 percent of votes, shareholders also waived the restriction of the voting rights limit of 10 percent of the share capital for each shareholder.
Rudolf Wehrli succeeded Jürg Witmer as Chairman of the Board of Directors, as both Witmer and Klaus Jenny retired from the Board.
PricewaterhouseCoopers AG was re-elected as auditors for the financial year 2012.
In his outlook, CEO Hariolf Kottmann confirmed the already announced expectations for 2012. An accurate forecast for 2012 is difficult to make, given the current level of economic uncertainty. In its base cases cenario, Clariant expects that, after a weak start to 2012, the global economy will progressively strengthen in the course of the year. Therefore, results for the first half-year are expected to be lower compared to the high base of the first half of 2011, with an improvement in the second half-year 2012. For full-year 2012, Clariant expects further sales growth in local currencies and sustained profitability.
