Czech CEZ shareholders approve 52 Kč-per-share dividend, Půta to join supervisory board

Today’s general meeting of energy company ČEZ ended shortly after 23:00, having lasted more than 14 hours. It approved a dividend of 52 Kč per share from last year’s adjusted profit. The company will thus distribute a total of 28 billion Kč to shareholders, equivalent to 80 percent of its profit. The state will receive around 19 billion Kč. The meeting also appointed Liberec Region Governor Martin Půta to the supervisory board. After nearly 11 hours spent discussing reports from the company’s management, the meeting picked up pace. It ended about an hour before midnight. Around 450 shareholders arrived at the Congress Centre in Prague today.

The dividend vote was traditionally the most anticipated item on today’s ČEZ general meeting agenda. This time, shareholders voted on a single proposal put forward by the company’s board of directors. Unlike last year, the state did not submit a counterproposal. The approved dividend is the company’s third-highest ever, matching the amount paid in 2021. ČEZ paid shareholders a record dividend last year, following a proposal by the state: 145 Kč per share, or 78 billion Kč in total. The only higher dividend was in 2009, when it amounted to 53 Kč per share.

Today’s ČEZ general meeting also addressed the composition of the supervisory board, which had one vacant seat. Martin Půta, the current governor of the Liberec Region, became its new member. He was the only candidate and was nominated by the Ministry of Finance.

The longest item on the agenda, however, was the first one, devoted to reports from the company’s board of directors and supervisory board. Shareholders most often asked the company’s management about its approach to the so-called windfall tax on unexpected profits. ČEZ paid the state 30.1 billion Kč under the tax last year.

In response to other shareholder questions today, management members said, for example, that mining at the Bílina lignite mine could end by 2030, rather than in 2035, the year until which ČEZ originally received permission to mine. Representatives of the partly state-owned company also said that the future of energy lies in renewable sources. Many questions also concerned the financing of new nuclear units. According to ČEZ, preparations for a new reactor at Dukovany have so far cost 3.5 billion Kč.

ČEZ earned 29.6 billion Kč last year, with the company’s net profit falling by more than 63 percent year on year. The company said the main reason was extraordinary taxes and levies, on which it paid more than 40 billion Kč. Despite the steep year-on-year decline, this was its highest profit in the past ten years, excluding the record year of 2022. Net profit adjusted for extraordinary items, which is key to determining the dividend, amounted to 34.8 billion Kč last year.

The ČEZ Group is one of the largest energy companies in Czechia. The state is its majority shareholder, holding around 70 percent of the shares through the Ministry of Finance.