On the 1 April 2003 the Annual General Meeting resolved to authorise the Board to decide on the acquisition of own shares in order to facilitate an effective management of the Group's capital. In accordance with this decision, the Board has decided to acquire a maximum of 20,000,000 shares of Class A and/or Class C via the Stockholm Stock Exchange at a total consideration of maximum SEK 2,300,000,000. The acquisitions may take place during the period until the ordinary Annual General Meeting in 2005.
The acquisitions, which will start today, shall take place within the so-called spread and the transactions will be reported via the Stockholm Stock Exchange in accordance with prevailing rules. Furthermore, SEB's web site (www.sebgroup.com) will be updated continuously.
The total number of shares in SEB amount to 704 557 680, whereof 673 784 123 shares are Class A and 30 773 557 shares are Class C. The Bank has previously acquired 19.400.000 own shares of Class A to hedge the outstanding employee stock options.
The SEB Group is a North European financial group for corporate customers, institutions and private individuals, with 670 branch offices around Sweden, Germany and the Baltic States. SEB has more than 4 million customers, of whom 1.6 million are e-banking customers. On 31 December 2003, the Group's total assets amounted to SEK 1,279 billion while its assets under management totalled SEK 822 billion. The Group is represented in some 20 countries around the world and has a staff of about 18,000. Read more about SEB at www.sebgroup.com.