At an extraordinary meeting, Altadis’ shareholders today changed a rule limiting any single shareholder's voting rights to 10 per cent after Imperial made it a pre-requisite for its takeover bid.

British Imperial Tobacco Group thus cleared the last major hurdle to buying rival Altadis in a cash bid of Euro 50 per share, valuing the Franco-Spanish cigarette manufacturer Altadis at Euro 12.6 billion (US$ 18.1 billion).
Altadis said 89.2 per cent of shareholders present at the meeting approved the change. They have until 11 January 2008 to accept the offer, which has already been cleared by regulators in both Brussels and Madrid.
Imperial has said its offer is conditional on it controlling 80 per cent of Altadis' shares. (pi)