Today Bekaert's Ordinary General Meeting of Shareholders took place, with Baron Buysse, Chairman of the Board of Directors, in the chair. The following main subjects were considered.

The meeting approved the balance sheet and the income statement as at 31 December 2011, as submitted by the Board of Directors, including the distribution of a gross dividend of € 0.50 per share. This will bring the total gross dividend for 2011 (including the interim dividend of € 0.67 paid on 17 October 2011) to € 1.17 compared with € 1.67 for 2010.

The dividend ex-date is 11 May 2012. The dividend will be payable on 16 May 2012 at the following banks: ING Belgium, Bank Degroof, BNP Paribas Fortis, KBC Bank and Belfius Bank in Belgium, Société Générale in France, ABN-AMRO Bank in the Netherlands and UBS in Switzerland.

The meeting approved the 2011 annual report of the Board of Directors, including the remuneration report for the year 2011. The meeting discharged the Directors and the Statutory Auditor for the performance of their duties during the financial year 2011 and approved the remuneration of the Directors and the Statutory Auditor.

The meeting accepted the recommendations:

• to re-appoint Baron Buysse and Sir Anthony Galsworthy as Directors for a term of two years, until the Ordinary General Meeting to be held in 2014;
• to re-appoint Baron Bekaert, Mr Bert De Graeve, Count Charles de Liedekerke, and Messrs Hubert Jacobs van Merlen and Maxime Jadot as Directors for a term of three years, until the Ordinary General Meeting to be held in 2015;
• to re-appoint Mr Manfred Wennemer as independent Director for a term of three years, until the Ordinary General Meeting to be held in 2015.

Today an Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders took place as well. The meeting extended the authorizations granted to the Board of Directors to buy back company shares and to increase the registered capital (authorized capital).