CEO: Russia’s NLMK board to approve Q4 dividends above policy

MOSCOW, Mar 24 (PRIME) -- The board of directors of Russian steel producer Novolipetsk Steel (NLMK) will recommend dividends exceeding the amount envisaged by the dividend policy for October–December 2015, CEO Oleg Bagrin told reporters on Thursday.

The NLMK dividend policy envisages payment of 50% of the US GAAP net profit and up to 50% of the free cash flow if the debt to EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) ratio is below or equals 1, and 30% of the net profit and cash flow if the ratio exceeds 1.

Bagrin said that the company’s financial performance was quite poor in October–December. “If we stick to the dividend policy, the payouts will be lower than on average in a quarter. We will most probably be recommending paying higher dividends than the dividend policy implies,” he said.

NLMK paid 11.687 billion rubles in dividends for April–July and 9.8 billion rubles for January–March.

(67.6409 rubles – U.S. $1)

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