BSE's general meeting of shareholders held today went on with no surprises, Profit.bg sources report.

All proposals made by the Board of Directors were approved by shareholders.

Plamen Georgiev leaves the Board of Directors at his own request. Ivan Takev was elected to replace him (after the Financial Supervision Commission approves him).

Stockholders also approved a decision to pay bonuses to the directors. BSE will spend 5.25 mln leva (2.68 mln euros) of its 2007 for the purpose. This has been a problematic issue that received much criticism from the Bulgarian Association of Licensed Investment Intermediaries.

“The Bulgarian Association of Licensed Investment Intermediaries has found a number of weak points in the 2007 financial report submitted by BSE. The stock exchange has seen some positive results, such as an increase in turnovers and revenues, but those were due to the market situation during the period and are not the result of measures and initiatives specifically taken by the BSE management. Costs are also significantly high for no justifiable reasons. In the report, BSE lists as its priorities the development of new markets and market instruments, improving the settlement mechanism, attracting new issuers etc. The Associations finds these priorities very favorable for the development of the capital market, but thinks that in view of the excellent financial condition of BSE, many of those could have been achieved already,” the Association says in a statement.

Today's meeting also decided to set 1/10 of 2007 income, or 525 068.26 leva, to the Reserves. 50% (2,362,807 leva/ or 1,208,084 euros) of the remaining part of the profit (4,725,614 leva, or 2,416,168 euros) will be distributed as dividend.

The other 50% will be allocated as bonuses to directors, and the rest will be added to Reserves.

Main shareholder in BSE is the Ministry of Finance, which has expressed its support for the current bourse management on many occasions.

We remind that the Bulgarian Association of Licensed Investment Intermediaries demanded the dismissal of all current members of BSE's Board of Directors and asked for the election of a new board.