FRANKFURT (AFP) - Deutsche Telekom, Europe's leading telecommunications group, said it planned to resume paying dividends this year after its shareholders had gone empty-handed for the past two years.
Deutsche Telekom said in a statement it planned to pay shareholders 0.62 euros (0.79 dollars) for every share held.
That was above the 0.46 euros analysts had been expecting.
As a result, Deutsche Telekom shares were among the biggest gainers on the Frankfurt stock exchange on Thursday, showing an increase of 4.73 percent at 15.72 euros in a slightly firmer market.
The group said the resumption of dividend payments would send a welcome signal to investors.
"We are back on track and we are once again a completely normal company," chairman Kai-Uwe Ricke told a news conference.
The 2004 dividend matched the payout in both 1999 and 2000 before the telecommunications giant plunged into a crisis sparked by the bursting of hi-tech and Internet bubble and the vast debt taken on to pay for the third-generation mobile phone licences.
Deutsche Telekom promised Thursday that the level of the 2004 payout would constitute a minimum for the dividend in coming years, too.
"I can promise you something: management will do everything to ensure a further rise in net profit and the payment of increased dividends in future," Ricke said.
Deutsche Telekom also raised its forecast for net profit this year to around 3.2 billion euros from a previous forecast of 2.5 billion euros.
Underlying profits, as measured by earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), were expected to amount to at least 19.2 billion euros.
In the third quarter alone, Deutsche Telekom booked bottom-line net profit of 1.387 billion euros, compared with 508 million euros a year earlier.
Underlying profits rose to 5.264 billion euros from 4.71 billion euros.
11/11/2004 - 11:28 GMT - AFP