HELSINKI, Finland, April 4, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- The Annual General Meeting of Metso Corporation approved today the accounts for 2005 as presented by the Board of Directors and voted to discharge the members of the Board of Directors and the President and CEO of Metso Corporation from liability for the financial year 2005. In addition, the Annual General Meeting approved the proposals of the Board of Directors. These applied to authorizations to resolve to repurchase and to dispose the Corporation's own shares, to increase the share capital by issuing new shares, convertible bonds and/or stock options.
The Annual General Meeting decided to establish a Nomination Committee of the Annual General Meeting to prepare proposals for the following Annual General Meeting in respect of the composition of the Board of Directors along with the director remuneration. Nomination Committee consists of the representatives appointed by the four biggest shareholders along with the Chairman of the Board of Directors as an expert member.
Matti Kavetvuo was re-elected the Chairman of the Board and Jaakko Rauramo, Chairman of the Board of SanomaWSOY Corporation, was re-elected the Vice Chairman of the Board. Christer Gardell, Managing Partner of Cevian Capital, and Professor, Ph.D. (EE) Yrjo Neuvo were elected as new members of the Board. Board members re-elected were Svante Adde, Managing Director, Compass Advisers, London; Maija-Liisa Friman, President and CEO of Aspocomp Group Oyj; and Satu Huber, State Treasury, Director of Finance and Head of Finance Division. The term of office of Board members lasts until the end of the next Annual General Meeting.
The Annual General Meeting decided that the annual remunerations for Board members be EUR 80,000 for the Chairman, EUR 50,000 for the Vice Chairman and the Chairman of the Audit Committee and EUR 40,000 for the members and that the meeting fee including committee meetings be EUR 500 for meeting.
The auditing company, Authorized Public Accountant PricewaterhouseCoopers was re-elected to act as an Auditor of the Corporation until the end of the next Annual General Meeting.
The Annual General Meeting decided that a dividend of EUR 1.40 per share be paid for the financial year which ended on December 31, 2005. The dividend consists of EUR 0.70 in line with the new dividend policy, and an extra dividend of EUR 0.70. The dividend will be paid to shareholders who have been entered as shareholders in the Corporation's shareholder register maintained by the Finnish Central Securities Depository Ltd. by the dividend record date, April 7, 2006. The dividend will be paid on April 20, 2006.
Metso is a global engineering and technology corporation with 2005 net sales of approximately EUR 4.2 billion. Its 22,000 employees in more than 50 countries serve customers in the pulp and paper industry, rock and minerals processing, the energy industry and selected other industries. www.metso.com