The 50th Annual General Meeting of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft took place on Thursday where the Volkswagen Shareholders approved the dividend proposal for the 2009 fiscal year. The move of the Board of Management and the Supervisory Board to pay a dividend of €1.60 against last year’s €1.93 per ordinary share and a dividend of €1.66 against last year’s €1.99 per preferred share was accepted largely by almost every one. The acceptance was by a 99.99% majority vote cast. As a result of this, €754 million will be directed from the net profit of Volkswagen AG for dividend distribution. Represented at the Annual General Meeting was 91.10 percent of the voting capital.
In addition to this, the Vice Chairman of Qatar Holding, Dr. Hussain Ali Al-Abdulla was elected to the Supervisory Board and will be the successor to Roland Oetker. Also, Jörg Bode, the Minister of Economic Affairs, Labor and Transport for the Federal State of Lower Saxony was elected by the General Meeting for a full term of office as a member of the Supervisory board.
Last but not the least, the Board of Management was also granted a global authorization to issue bearer bonds with warrants and/or bearer convertible bonds in the total amount of up to €5 billion with a maximum term of about 20 years on one or several occasions in the period up to April 21, 2015. The authorization was passed by a majority of 2.57 percent with 28.57 percent of the voting capital represented at a Special Meeting of Preferred Shareholders.