Shareholders to vote on return of stock

Vodafone's 400,000-plus Irish shareholders will be asked to vote today on a plan that will see the company return £9 billion to stockholders.

The company is proposing to issue eight B shares for every eight shares held by individual shareholders, and then to consolidate their holding by replacing their existing eight ordinary shares with seven new shares.

The B shares cannot be traded on the market, but will be valued at 15 pence sterling each. Irish holders can opt to redeem immediately for that price, and will be paid on August 11th.

Alternatively, they can opt to receive a single dividend of 15p per B share, and convert these shares to deferred stock.

They will also have the option of keeping all or some of the B shares. They can redeem a portion immediately and redeem the balance at different stages between tomorrow and August 5th, 2008. Or they can keep all their B shares for redemption before or on that date. Vodafone will pay a dividend on any B shares that shareholders keep.