Financial Times: Lex live: Royal Dutch/Shell
Tuesday 28 June 2005
UK budgets under Gordon Brown’s tenure have shown that taxation and simplicity rarely go hand in hand. But the complexities produced by Royal Dutch/Shell’s unification give the chancellor a run for his money.
To avoid Shell shareholders having to pay Dutch withholding tax – and no doubt to appease British and Dutch interests – the company will retain two classes of shares. The A shares, representing Royal Dutch stock, currently trade at a 3.5 per cent discount to the B shares, representing Shell Transport & Trading. Is this discount justified?
The B shares will not suffer 15 per cent Dutch withholding tax on dividends and hence offer a better return to UK pension funds. In theory this justifies a premium. But the fair value of the spread is difficult to estimate since it depends on the type and geographical mix of investors. US and Dutch investors, for example, receive the same dividend from either class of share. The spread’s fair value is estimated at 2 to 6 per cent.
The merged group’s weighting in the FTSE All-Share will more than double to above 7 per cent. Surveys of institutional holdings suggest fund managers remain underweight ahead of the index change, although “closet” tracking makes the required buying difficult to estimate. But it will run to billions of pounds. Owning only B shares runs the risk of index tracking errors and should ensure buying is concentrated in the A shares.
Meanwhile Shell has announced that its $3bn-$5bn share buyback this year will be entirely in A shares. So far only $500m has been completed. These factors should push the spread between A and B shares, which has narrowed recently, closer to parity.
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
