ARMS drops plan to distribute Berau Coal shares
Tuesday, May 20 2014 - 01:20 AM WIB
London-listed Asia Resources Minerals (ARMS) said that it has decided not to proceed with a proposal from some shareholders to distribute dividend in specie of the company?s shares in IDX-listed coal miner PT Berau Coal Tbk.
On 6 May 2014, ARMS announced that a number of the company's major shareholders had indicated a clear wish for a dividend in specie of the company's shares in PT Berau and that the board was actively soliciting shareholders views on this matter to establish whether such a plan could gain broad shareholder acceptance.
In addition, as part of the Separation transaction, the board committed to return at least US$400m of cash to shareholders via a B-share scheme.
?Following this solicitation process, the board does not believe that there is consensus among the company's shareholders sufficient to allow a dividend in specie of the company's PT Berau shares to be carried out at this time,? ARMS said in a statement issued Monda.
?However, a very significant number of shareholders indicated a desire for a cash distribution to take place as soon as possible. As a result, the board intends to focus on implementing the cash distribution,? it added.
ARMS said it intends to propose a B-share scheme to the company's shareholders to return US$465 million, which after shareholder consultation and the board's due consideration, the board deems to be the appropriate level of cash distribution.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak