Toronto, May 12, 2005 – BNN Split Corp. announced today that income available for distribution for the six months ended March 31, 2005 was $6.2 million, compared to $4.7 million in the same period last year. Investment income for this period increased from $5.0 million to $6.4 million due principally to dividends received on 3 million additional Brascan Class A Limited Voting shares acquired in 2004. Operating expenses decreased to $0.1 million in 2005 compared to $0.3 million in 2004 due to costs associated with the additional Preferred share issue in 2004. For the quarter ended March 31, 2005, the company paid dividends of $2.9 million and $0.1 million to its Preferred and Capital shareholders respectively, compared with $2.0 million and $0.6 million for the same period in 2004.
The Board of Directors declared quarterly dividends of $0.390625, $0.309375 and $0.01477 per Preferred share Class A, and Class AA Series 1 and Capital share of the company, respectively, payable on June 7, 2005 to shareholders of record on May 22, 2005.
The net asset value per unit, consisting of one Preferred share and one Capital share, was $84.53 based on a Brascan share price of $45.70 as at March 31, 2005. The net asset value per Preferred share is posted monthly on www.bamsplit.com.
STATEMENTS OF INCOME AND DEFICIT
|
Three months ended March 31 |
Six months ended March 31
|
(unaudited)
$thousands |
2005
|
2004
|
2005 |
2004 |
Income
|
|
|
|
|
Investment
|
$3,080
|
$2,501 |
$6,363 |
$5,005 |
Expenses
|
|
|
|
|
Operating
|
44
|
52
|
124
|
284
|
Income available for distribution
|
3,036
|
2,449
|
6,239
|
4,721 |
Dividends paid on Senior Preferred shares
|
(2,944)
|
(1,953)
|
(5,886) |
(3,907)
|
Income available for distribution on Capital and Class A Voting shares
|
92
|
496
|
353 |
814 |
Dividends paid on Capital shares
|
(92)
|
(600) |
(353) |
(1,200) |
| |
-
|
(104) |
- |
(386)
|
Deficit, beginning of period
|
(7,774) |
(4,164) |
(7,774) |
(3,882) |
Share issue costs
|
- |
(2,600)
|
-
|
(2,600) |
Deficit, end of period
|
$(7,774) |
$(6,868)
|
$(7,774)
|
$(6,868)
|
Dividends per Senior Preferred share - Class A
|
$0.3906 |
$0.3906
|
$0.7813
|
$0.7813
|
Dividends per Senior Preferred share - Class AA, Series 1
|
$0.3094
|
$-
|
$0.6188
|
$-
|
BNN Split Corp. owns a portfolio consisting of 17,418,000 Class A Limited Voting Shares of Brascan Corporation in order to generate quarterly fixed cumulative preferential dividends for the holders of the company's Preferred shares and to enable the holders of the company's Capital shares to participate in any capital appreciation of Brascan Shares. Brascan Corporation is an asset management company, with a focus on property, power and other infrastructure assets. Brascan has direct investments of US$20 billion and a further US$20 billion of assets under management. This includes 70 premier office properties and over 120 power generating plants. Brascan is listed on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges under the symbols BNN and BNN.LV.A, respectively.
Sachin G. Shah, Chief Financial Officer, will be available at (416) 363-0061 to answer any questions on the company's financial results.
This news release contains forward-looking statements concerning the company's business and operations. The company cautions that, by their nature, forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainty and the company's actual results could differ materially from those expressed or implied in such statements. Reference should be made to the most recent Annual Information Form for a description of the major risk factors.