MONTREAL,
May 31, 2012 /CNW Telbec/ - The Board
of Directors of SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. (the "Corporation") has
filed a notice to renew, for a 12-month period, its normal course
issuer bid, which will expire on June 1,
2012. In the notice, the Corporation states that a
maximum of 3,000,000 Common Shares, representing less than 2% of
the issued and outstanding Common Shares as of May 17, 2012, may be purchased for
cancellation. As of May 17,
2012, the Corporation had 151,034,276 Common Shares issued
and outstanding, 127,916,992 of which made up the public
float. As a general practice when managing its capital, the
Corporation repurchases its Common Shares mainly to offset the
dilutive effect of stock issuance under its stock option
programs.
These purchases are to be made through the
facilities of the Toronto Stock
Exchange and/or alternative Canadian trading systems, in accordance
with the Toronto Stock Exchange's policy on normal course issuer
bids. The price the Corporation will pay for any Common Shares
will be the market price at the time of acquisition, plus brokerage
fees. Purchases may commence on June 4,
2012 and will terminate no later than June 3, 2013. Certain directors and senior
officers of the Corporation may sell securities of the Corporation
during the course of the normal course issuer bid.
During the period that the Normal Course Issuer
Bid is outstanding, the Corporation does not intend to make
purchases of its Common Shares other than by means of open market
transactions or such other means as may be permitted by the Toronto
Stock Exchange and securities regulatory authorities as applicable,
including block purchases of Common Shares.
The average daily trading volume of the
Corporation's Common Shares through the facilities of the Toronto
Stock Exchange over the last six completed calendar months was
707,221 ("ADTV"). Accordingly, under the Toronto Stock Exchange
Rules and policies, the Corporation is entitled on any trading day
to purchase up to 25% of the ADTV, which totals 176,805 Common
Shares, for the next 12-month period of the Normal Course Issuer
Bid. In excess of the daily 176,805 repurchase limit, the
Corporation may also purchase, once a week, a block of Common
Shares not owned by any insiders, which may exceed such daily
limit, in accordance with the Toronto Stock Exchange Rules.
During the period from June 2, 2011 to May 17,
2012 inclusively, the Corporation purchased 444,200 of its
outstanding Common Shares, at a weighted average price of
$45.31.
SNC-Lavalin (TSX: SNC) is one of the leading
engineering and construction groups in the world and a major player
in the ownership of infrastructure, and in the provision of
operations and maintenance services. SNC-Lavalin has offices across
Canada and in over 40 other
countries around the world, and is currently working in some 100
countries. www.snclavalin.com
Reference in this press release, and hereafter, to the
"Company" or to "SNC-Lavalin" means, as the context may require,
SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. and all or some of its subsidiaries or joint
ventures, or SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. or one or more of its
subsidiaries or joint ventures. Statements made in this press
release that describe the Company's or management's budgets,
estimates, expectations, forecasts, objectives, predictions or
projections of the future may be "forward-looking statements",
which can be identified by the use of the conditional or
forward-looking terminology such as "anticipates", "believes",
"estimates", "expects", "may", "plans", "projects", "should",
"will", or the negative thereof or other variations thereon.
The Company cautions that its actual actions and/or results could
differ materially from those expressed or implied in
forward-looking statements, or could affect the extent to which a
particular projection materializes, as a result of risks and
uncertainties relating to: (a) cost overruns from fixed-price
contracts; (b) failure to meet scheduled dates or performance
standards on a particular project; (c) attracting and retaining
qualified personnel and any strike, partial work stoppage or other
labour actions by the Company's or its subcontractors' unionized
employees; (d) failure of the Company's joint venture partners to
perform their obligations; (e) failure by the Company's
subcontractors to deliver their portion of a particular project
according to contractual terms; (f) the financial performance of
the Company's infrastructure concession investments during a
particular concession period; (g) the Company obtaining new
contract awards; (h) revenue backlog and whether such revenue
backlog will ultimately result in earnings and when revenues and
earnings from such backlog will be recognized; (i) foreign currency
exchange and interest rates; (j) credit risk and the delay in
collection from the Company's clients; (k) information management
including its integrity, reliability and security; (l) the inherent
limitations of the Company's control framework and the
effectiveness of the measures implemented by the Company to
strengthen its internal controls over financial reporting following
the identification by the Company of material weaknesses relating
to the design and operational effectiveness of its internal
controls over financial reporting as of December 31, 2011 and March
31, 2012 respectively; (m) uncertain economic and political
conditions in the countries in which the Company does business; (n)
any lack of strong safety practices by the Company or its
subcontractors exposing the Company to lost time on projects,
penalties, lawsuits and impact on future contract awards; (o) the
Company's inability to comply with environmental laws and
regulations; (p) the Company's reputation as a result of, among
others, any quality or performance issues on its projects, a poor
health and safety record, non-compliance with laws or regulations
by the Company's employees, agents, subcontractors, suppliers
and/or partners, or creation of pollution and contamination; (q)
the inability to adequately integrate an acquired business in a
timely manner; (r) non-compliance with laws and regulations by an
employee, agent, supplier, subcontractor and/or partner of the
Company or any further regulatory developments; (s) failure by the
Company's employees, agents, suppliers, subcontractors and/or
partners to comply with anti-bribery laws; (t) any litigation
and/or legal matters to which the Company is a party; (u) any
negative publicity associated with the Independent Review led by
the Company's Audit Committee of the facts and circumstances
surrounding certain payments that were documented to construction
projects to which they did not relate, and certain other contracts,
as well as any sanctions that could be brought against the Company
in connection with possible violations of law or contracts should
additional facts adverse to the Company become known in connection
with such Independent Review including as to matters beyond its
scope; (v) the proposed class action lawsuit filed on March 1, 2012
against the Company with the Quebec Superior Court and the proposed
class action lawsuits filed on May 9, 2012 against the Company with
the Ontario Superior Court; and (w) the investigations of the Royal
Canadian Mounted Police and the World Bank relating to the
Company's involvement in a past submission as the Owner's Engineer
for the Bangladesh government.
For more information on risks and uncertainties, and assumptions
that would cause the Company's actual results to differ from
current expectations, please refer to the section "Risks and
Uncertainties" and the section "How We Analyze and Report our
Results", respectively, in the Company's 2011 Financial Report
under "Management's Discussion and Analysis" and the section "Risks
and Uncertainties" in the Company's first quarter 2012 Management's
Discussion and Analysis. The forward-looking statements herein
reflect the Company's expectations as at the date of this press
release and are subject to change after this date. The Company does
not undertake any obligation to update publicly or to revise any
such forward-looking statements, unless required by applicable
legislation or regulation. |
SOURCE SNC-LAVALIN