Smurfit-Kappa suspends dividend

IRISH headquartered packaging group Smurfit-Kappa (SKG) has made a loss of €11 million for 2008 and has said that it will suspend dividend payments to shareholders in light of what management referred to as “an increasingly difficult market backdrop”.

The Dublin-based group — one of the largest players in the international paper and packaging industry, with operations across Europe and Latin America — also reported a 3% drop in full-year revenue to just over €7.06 billion and a 12% fall in earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) — excluding exceptional items — to €941m.

SKG chief executive Gary McGann called the performance “relatively strong” given the worsening economic and market conditions and added they were in line with market expectations. He also pointed to the group’s achievement of reducing its net debt by €281m to €3.2bn.