Two weeks from approving the said dividends, the Board announced they would be lower and a new General Meeting of Shareholders would be held, arguing the need to finance expansion of operations to France and Bulgaria, which changes investor expectations.
On November 7, Foraj Sonde Videle announced after the end of the trading session that a shareholder meeting had been called for December 15 to vote on the distribution of RON42 million dividends, which translates into a RON3.712 gross dividend per share. The dividend proposition passed on December 16, after a lack of quorum on December 15 and the payment should have been made on January 30.
However, after the close on December 23, the company published a new call to a shareholder meeting set for January 28, to vote on lowering the already approved dividend from RON3.712/share to RON2.6174/share, citing the need to finance its international expansion strategy, as it said in a report to the Bucharest Stock Exchange.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)