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I do not expect President George W. Bush or anyone in his tobacco-friendly administration praise the efforts of the Gates and Mayor Bloomberg. This, after all, is a president who greeted his Surgeon General's June 2006 report on the menace of second-hand smoke by showing him the door and throwing the report in the trash. Thoughtful and caring individuals, however, owe a great debt of gratitude to this most generous and honorable trio. Three cheers.
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Brooke Group Ltd. (NYSE: BGL - news) announced today that it has declared a regular quarterly cash dividend on its common stock of $0.25 per share, payable December 28, 1999, to holders of record as of December 21, 1999.
Liggett Group sued its former defense lawyers to force the release of 2,600 boxes of company and industry tobacco documents stretching back more than four decades.
The suit was filed in federal court in Brooklyn, N.Y., against the Los Angeles firm Latham & Watkins. The suit contends that Liggett needs the records to comply with pretrial fact-finding requests in a suit brought against it and other tobacco companies by a coalition of Blue Cross and Blue Shield insurance plans. That case is now pending before U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein in Brooklyn.
Our position is that this can not be done by your firm because of the privacy interest of prior counsel in its work product and because of your client's present posture of adversity [with other tobacco firms]. Law firm Latham & Watkins, in a letter to Liggett attorney Aaron H. Marks, who asked to cull through all the records to determine which might fall under the nondisclosure privilege. Quoted in GEYELIN M. <i>Liggett Sues Its Former Lawyers To Force Release of Documents</i>
Third quarter 1999 revenues were $150.2 million, compared to revenues of $108.2 million in the third quarter of 1998. The Company recorded operating income of $19.4 million in the 1999 third quarter compared to operating income of $13.0 million in 1998. Net income in the 1999 third quarter was $5.9 million, or $0.20 per diluted common share. This compares to a net loss of $9.4 million, or $0.43 per diluted common share, in the 1998 period.
Brooke Group Ltd. (BGL), in addition to boosting Chairman Bennett S. LeBow's cash compensation 11.8% in 1998, awarded the tobacco executive stock options for the first time in three years.
LeBow, who also is president and chief executive of Brooke, the holding company for tobacco maker Liggett Group Ltd., received options for 2.625 million shares of common stock, according to a proxy filed Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The options, which have an exercise price of $9.29 a share, have an assumed value of about $20.5 million, the filing said.
Brooke Group Ltd. (NYSE: BGL - news) today announced that its Board of Directors has voted to increase the Company's quarterly cash dividend on its common stock from $0.075 per share to $0.25 per share. Additionally, the Company is implementing a new, annual stock dividend of 5%. Both the quarterly cash and the annual stock dividends are payable on September 30, 1999 to holders of record as of September 24, 1999.
Brooke Group Ltd., owner of the No. 5 U.S. tobacco company, more than tripled its quarterly cash dividend and said it will begin paying a 5 percent annual stock dividend after a turnaround in cigarette operations. Miami-based Brooke said it boosted its quarterly dividend to 25 cents a share from 7.5 cents because of improved performance and better prospects at its Liggett Group and Liggett-Ducat Ltd. units . . Following settlement of smoking-related litigation, Liggett's operating margins have improved in tandem with more revenue from price increases.
But even without money from the Philip Morris deal, Brooke's second quarter shows the company's operations are improving. The Miami-based company reported $116 million in revenues for the quarter compared with $111 million in revenues during the second quarter of 1998.
Liggett, which produces most of Brooke's income, reported revenues of $94 million for the second quarter of 1999 compared with $83.4 million during the second quarter of 1998.
Second quarter 1999 revenues were $115.9 million, compared to revenues of $111.3 million in the second quarter of 1998. The Company recorded operating income of $13.6 million in the 1999 second quarter compared to operating income of $12.9 million in 1998. Net income in the 1999 second quarter was $214.8 million, or $8.21 per diluted common share, which includes a pre-tax gain of $294.3 million in connection with the closing of the Philip Morris brand transaction on May 24, 1999. This compares to a net loss of $14.8 million, or $.72 per diluted common share, in the 1998 period.
``The company is absolutely not considering bankruptcy as an option,'' a company spokesman told Reuters.
Liggett previously had said a bankruptcy filing might be considered if courts rejected its proposal to pay up to 7.5 percent of its annual pretax income, or a minimum of $1 million a year, for 25 years to settle lawsuits filed by ill smokers.
Judge Kendall found the "present value" of the Liggett settlement was $75 million, compared with the company's current net worth of about $200 million. As a result, "this court cannot and does not find that the exhaustion requirement identified in Ortiz has been met," he wrote.
Brooke Group Ltd. announced today that the Alabama State Court in Mobile has denied final approval of a limited fund settlement agreement between Brooke and its Liggett Group tobacco subsidiary and class action plaintiffs and individual smokers nationwide in Fletcher, et al. v. Brooke Group Ltd., et al. In the ruling, the Alabama State Court attributed the decision to the recent Supreme Court decision in Ortiz v. Fibreboard Corp. [This graph only]
A Supreme Court ruling on a class-action settlement in an asbestos case could impact the deal struck between Miami's Liggett Group, a cigarette manufacturer, and smokers who had filed health-related claims against the company. . . So-called limited fund settlements have often been used to bring an end to class-action cases, but the practice has been quite controversial.
One of the most controversial has been Liggett's settlement in tobacco litigation, which has been given tentative approval by an Alabama court. . . But the proposed settlement has been hotly contested at subsequent fairness hearings, facing charges that Liggett is paying too little. The case is currently before Alabama Circuit Judge Baxton Kittrell in Mobile, Ala., who is yet to make his final decision.
Health insurers and other opponents of a class-action settlement worked out in an Alabama courtroom for Liggett Corp. said the tobacco firm is capable of paying more under the pact.
But Liggett attorneys said damage verdicts could bankrupt the firm.
In a fairness hearing on the settlement today in Alabama Circuit Court in Mobile, accountant and turnaround expert Christopher Kearns of New York's Kahn Consultants said Liggett, with about $54 million in pretax earnings for 1998, does not have the resources to face mounting numbers of smoker suits. ``Clearly (the claims) would force Liggett into bankruptcy, to seek protection under Chapter 11,'' Kearns told Judge Robert Kendall.