NEW YORK: India-born billionaire Lakshmi Mittal will get a hefty dividend package of $935.5 million this year by virtue of his stake in the world's largest steel producer ArcelorMittal.
The company on Monday announced its dividend payment schedule for 2008, as part of which, it would make four quarterly payments of 0.375 dollars per share in the months of March, June, September and December.
Mittal, who holds 623.62 million shares of the firm, would get 233.85 million dollars at each payout.
Mittal family is the promoter of the company with a 43.04 per cent stake, valued at about 39.1 billion dollars, while other public shareholders hold 56.96 per cent.
The company would pay a total dividend of about 2.2 billion dollars, which would include about 1.2 billion dollars to be paid to non-promoter shareholders.
ArcelorMittal on Monday said a gross dividend of 1.50 dollars per share (paid on a quarterly basis) would be submitted to the shareholders' approval at the next Annual General Meeting on May 13. The quarterly payments of 0.375 dollar per share will occur on March 17, June 16, September 15 and December 15, it added.
Dividends are announced in US dollar terms and paid in the same currency for shares listed on the New York Stock Exchange and paid in Euros for shares listed on the European exchanges (the Netherlands, France, Spain, Luxembourg and Belgium).
The company said that the gross dividend amount would attract a tax of 15 per cent, as applicable in Luxembourg.
ArcelorMittal on Monday also preponed the scheduled date for its second quarter results to July 30, from August six as announced earlier.
ArcelorMittal is the world's largest steel company with 320,000 employees in more than 60 countries.
Having established an industrial presence in 27 European, Asian, African and American countries, it is now looking to develop in the high-growth Chinese and Indian markets.
Its revenue in 2006 stood at 88.6 billion dollars, with crude steel production of 118 million tons, representing around 10 per cent of global steel output.
