Lippstadt, 28 April 2023. At today's Annual General Meeting of HELLA GmbH & Co. KGaA, the shareholders followed the company management’s proposal to pay a dividend of €2.88 per share for the short fiscal year 2022 with a large majority of 99.99 percent. HELLA's shareholders also approved all other items on the agenda with a large majority.
The approved total dividend of €2.88 per share firstly consists of a regular dividend of €0.27 per share. The company is thus continuing its established dividend policy of distributing around 30 percent of net profit (excluding the sale of HBPO shares) as a dividend. Secondly, in view of the exit from the HBPO joint venture completed on 12 December 2022, an additional special dividend of €2.61 will be paid. In total, the distribution amount is €320 million.
In the seven-month short fiscal year 2022 (1 June to 31 December 2022), HELLA had generated sales of €4.4 billion and an adjusted EBIT margin of 5.0 percent. "2022 was characterized by many challenges on the market side. Nevertheless, we have demonstrated high resilience as a company, managed very solidly and achieved strong results," said HELLA CEO Michel Favre in his speech.
Favre sees the company well positioned for the future: "We are already at the forefront of mobility. Our business development is on the right track, our order intake is strong. We are on course for growth.” HELLA had already announced the outlook for the current fiscal year 2023 on 16 February this year. Accordingly, the company expects, among other things, to achieve sales* in the range of around €8.0 to 8.5 billion in the fiscal year 2023 (1 January to 31 December 2023). This would be the highest value ever achieved by HELLA to date.
This year, the HELLA Annual General Meeting was held in Rheda-Wiedenbrück for the very first time. In total, around 120 shareholders and guests attended the on-site event. At the time of the vote, 87.93 percent of the share capital was represented.
The individual voting results as well as the speech of the HELLA CEO will be available on the company's homepage in the Investor Relations section under Annual General Meeting 2023.
* currency and portfolio-adjusted