In a statement sent to the Portuguese Securities Market Commission (CMVM), the bank said that at the meeting there were 26 shareholders representing 95.08 percent of the bank’s capital, and CaixaBank’s proposal for BPI to lose its status as a publicly-held company was approved by 99.26 percent of the votes cast.
The second item on the agenda - a CaixaBank proposal to reduce the members of the board of directors from 20 to 18 members in the 2017-2019 term (following the resignation in May of directors Vicente Tardio and Carla Bambulo) - was approved by 99.99 percent of the votes cast.
The new dividend policy, which was the third and last point of the general meeting, was approved by 99.97 percent of the shareholders present or represented.
This new policy provides for “the distribution of an annual dividend for the financial year ... of between 30 percent and 50 percent of the net profit calculated in the individual accounts for the year to which it relates, and the actual amount to be proposed should be defined based on a prudent judgment that takes into account, in view of the specific situation in which the bank finds itself, the permanent satisfaction of adequate levels of liquidity and solvency.”
Since the beginning of 2017, BPI has been controlled by Spanish group CaixaBank, which already owns more than 94 percent of the Portuguese bank’s share capital, after buying a stake owned by insurer Allianz in May.
In the first quarter of this year, BPI made a profit of €210 million, compared with a loss of €122 million in the first three months of 2017.