Estonia, Financial Services

Tallink on Thursday made a proposal to a general meeting of shareholders to pay a dividend of 5 cents per share or altogether 35 mln euros, the company is to also reduce its share capital by 7 cents per share.

"Tallink's dividend and share capital reduction plan was relatively clearly indicated already in fall, so there were no surprises in that regard and the shareholders can be fully satisfied with a payment of 12 cents in total," Danil told.

The analyst added that it must be taken into account that the decreasing of the share capital by 7 cents per share is an extraordinary move and this is why the dividend will remain on its usual level of 5-6 cents per share in the following years.

Tallink wants to reduce the share capital by the reduction of the book value of the shares by 7 cents per share, as a result of which the book value of one share shall be reduced from 54 cents to 47 cents. Based on the foregoing, the share capital of the public limited company shall decrease from 361.7 mln euros by 46.9 mln euros, and the new share capital shall be 314.8 mln euros.

Of the 40 mln euro net profit for 2018, the company wishes to allocate 2 mln euros to the mandatory legal reserve and transfer 4.6 mln euros to the retained earnings.