Shareholder revolt stops sale and appoints new board
Fortis shareholders voted against selling parts of the financial group to BNP Paribas, the French bank, and against the nationalising the banking and insurance group in the Netherlands, The FT reports.
Shareholders ignored warnings from Jan-Michiel Hessels, the acting chairman, that Fortis faced potential bankruptcy if the BNP sale did not go through.
The vote was held only after a group of shareholders took Fortis to court over the decision to carve up the company without seeking shareholder approval.
Georges Uguex, elected as part of a new board immediately after the no vote said: “This is an extraordinary victory for good governance. Our task now should be creating shareholder value”. He called on the Belgian government and BNP to enter new talks.
The motion to approve the nationalisation of Fortis in the Netherlands attracted just 42.9% of the vote. A motion to approve the sale to the state of a 50% plus one share stake in Fortis Bank Belgium won 49.74% of the vote with about one in five Fortis shareholders exercising their votes.
The second vote effectively blocked the sale of a 75% stake in Fortis Bank Belgium and 10% in Fortis’s Belgian insurance operations to BNP Paribas because BNP’s agreement was to buy the stake in the bank from the state.
