Free Shares
A benefit granted by Air Liquide to all its Shareholders
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Air Liquide regularly(a) issues free shares to all its Shareholders. In June 2022, Air Liquide made its 31st allocation of free shares, with a parity of 1 bonus share for every 10 held.
For all Shareholders, free share allocations enable you to expand your portfolio over time. In addition to passing on approximately 55% of its net income in the form of dividends, Air Liquide distributes a portion of its retained earnings (b) to all its Shareholders in the form of free shares in proportion to the number of shares already held. The free shares allocated give the same right to dividends as the shares from which they are derived.
At the time of the June 2022 free share distribution, any Shareholder who held 100 shares for more than two full calendar years (before January 1, 2020):
If the number of shares you hold is not a multiple of the allocation parity, an amount corresponding to the value of the fraction of shares that cannot be distributed, called “ fractional shares”, will be paid to your bank account.
(a) Nine free share distributions in the last 20 years.
(b) Portion of past undistributed net profits.
A Shareholder holds 225 shares in his portfolio. He, thus, receives 22 bonus shares (1 bonus share for 10 shares held) and the value in euros of 5 fractional shares (0.5 shares).
Among these 225 shares, 112 benefit from the loyalty bonus: he therefore receives 1 additional bonus share (+10% in bonus shares, i.e. 1 additional bonus share for 100 shares held) and the value in euros of 1.2 fractional shares (0.12 shares).
Your benefits are maintained
Free shares have the same characteristics as the shares they are derived from: eligibility for the loyalty bonus, seniority, voting rights, dividend rights.
The allocation of free shares is done on an account-by-account basis and also on a holding-by-holding basis: there is no fungibility of fractional shares. So, if you have shares in an ordinary securities account and in a Share Savings Plan (Plan d’Epargne en Actions, PEA in French) or if you hold intermediary registered shares and bearer shares, the non-fungibility of fractional shares means that these fractional shares cannot be added together to create a new additional free share.
