Basel, April 28, 2017. At the Annual General Meeting, the shareholders of Bâloise Holding Ltd voted in favour of all the proposals on the agenda put forward by the Board of Directors, thus approving a CHF 0.20 increase in the dividend to CHF 5.20 per share. Thomas von Planta was newly elected to the Board of Directors. The Chairman of the Board of Directors bade farewell to CFO German Egloff and CIO Martin Wenk as they stepped down from Baloise Group's Corporate Executive Committee after many years spent working for the good of Baloise.
Baloise's 'digital pathfinders' - employees who are able to offer ad-hoc IT support - were deployed for the first time at the Annual General Meeting. The digital pathfinders are also set to share their expertise at future Baloise events.

Cancellation of 1.2 million shares increase attractiveness

The Baloise Annual General Meeting approved the Company's 2016 annual report and separate and consolidated annual financial statements, and formally approved the actions of the members of the Board of Directors and management team. The Annual General Meeting voted in favour of all proposals by the Board of Directors. Consequently, the 1.2 million treasury shares repurchased as part of the share buy-back programme that ended in July 2016 are being cancelled. This will reduce the company's share capital from CHF 5,000,000 to CHF 4,880,000 in nominal terms. Earnings per share will increase as a result. The new share buy-back programme, which was announced at the 2016 Investor Day, was launched at the start of April 2017 and will run for a maximum of three years. By undertaking this repurchase of three million shares, Baloise is confirming its status as an attractive long-term investment for its shareholders.

Thomas von Planta newly elected to the Board of Directors

Thomas von Planta has been newly elected to the Board of Directors. Michael Becker did not stand for re-election. All other members of the Board of Directors were re-elected for a term of one year, and Andreas Burckhardt was confirmed as Chairman of the Board of Directors for a term of one year. The Annual General Meeting re-elected the following people to the Remuneration Committee: Georges-Antoine de Boccard, Karin Keller-Sutter, Thomas Pleines and Marie-Noëlle Venturi - Zen-Ruffinen. It also re-elected Christophe Sarasin as independent proxy. Ernst & Young AG, Basel, was elected as the statutory auditor for a further year.

Taking responsibility: not just in the company, but in society too

'Baloise can once again look back on an outstanding year. I am proud of our efforts and would like to thank all employees for what they have achieved,' says Andreas Burckhardt, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Bâloise Holding Ltd. 'A company's success is closely related to how deeply it is anchored in society. So being successful also means taking responsibility. Baloise does this in many different ways - both as a company and in the form of initiatives by its employees. At today's Annual General Meeting, for example, there were numerous digital pathfinders in attendance. These experts from the IT department were on hand to offer ad-hoc technical support to shareholders,' continued Burckhardt. 'In recent weeks, Baloise has positioned itself as a pioneer in the digital insurance business, so it makes sense to share this expertise with shareholders.'

The full speech in German by Andreas Burckhardt, Chairman of the Board of Directors, can be downloaded from www.baloise.com and can be watched as a video stream from 2 May 2017 at https://www.youtube.com/BaloiseGroup.

Further information

Media kit for the Annual General Meeting at www.baloise.com.

Baloise Holding AG published this content on 28 April 2017 and is solely responsible for the information contained herein.
Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 10 May 2017 10:06:20 UTC.

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