BRIEF—Roche shareholders vote for share buy-back from Novartis

Earlier this month, Novartis agreed to sell 53.3 million (around 33%) bearer shares of fellow Swiss pharma giant Roche in a bilateral transaction to Roche for a total consideration of $20.7 billion.

At today's Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders, the board of directors of Swiss pharma giant Roche therefore proposed the approval of a share capital reduction by cancellation of 53,309,000 bearer shares to be repurchased from Novartis and the approval of the interim financial statements prepared for the purpose of this transaction.

Today's meeting approved all proposals of the board of directors with a majority of 99.85%.

Therefore, the corporate law requirements for the repurchase have been satisfied. The closing of the repurchase transaction is expected to take place in early December 2021.

Christoph Franz, chairman of Roche's board, commented: "Today's resolutions of the Extraordinary General Meeting are in the best economic and strategic interest of Roche. As a result, we will be even better positioned to make a contribution to the health of people around the world."