| Abstract: |
Diversified mining major BHP Billiton, whose record 2009 dividend represents a sixfold growth in seven years, has paid a massive $32-billion in cash to shareholders since BHP and Billiton merged in 2001, BHP Billiton CEO Marius Kloppers said on Wednesday.
This year's dividend payout of $4,6-billion, in the teeth of the worst economic downturn since the 1930s, was not only an all-time company record, but it also totalled considerably more than its entire net operating cash flow of 2002. |