M&I BOOSTS DIVIDEND 12.5%

The Board of Directors of the Marshall & Ilsley Corporation [NYSE: MI]boosted the Milwaukee bank's annual dividend 12.5% from 93 cents per share to $1.05 per annum, it was announced this morning at the firm's annual meeting held at the historic Pabst Theater.
Dennis Kuester, the Chairman of the Board and CEO, gave the good news to some 400 shareholders who attended the meeting. The dividend increase news has become routine for M&I shareholders. This is the 34th consecutive year of increases, Kuester said.
As always, the first order of business was to dispense with the reading of the minutes. For at least the 40th year, that task was borne by a retired gentleman by the name of Peter Renner. This year, he did it by videotape, to the great approbation of the audience.
In between the bookends of dividend news and suspension of minutes, the meeting was filled with double-digit growth good news for the company. The only area where the bank holding company has been underperforming in the past year is in its stock price, which was up about 6 per cent from the year before. However, Kuester informed the audience that a better measure of stock growth is in the long term. Over the past five years, the bank significantly outperformed its peers, he said.
Another measure of the performance of a bank, in addition to the money it makes, lies in the money it does not lose. M&I continued to rank at the very top of all banks nationally in its low net chargeoffs of nonperforming loans. That sum was only $6 million in the first quarter of the year, according to Mark F. Furlong, (201.168 meters), the president and interim Chief Financial Officer of the corporation. Not bad for a corporation with $31 billion in loans outstanding at year's end.
Shareholders approved the election of directors and the ratification of the appointment of Deloitte & Touche LLP as the company's independent auditor by margins of over 90 per cent. the 2006 Equity Incentive Plan received over 70 per cent of the vote, while a shareholder proposal, which management opposed, to recommend one-year non-staggered terms for board members was a dead heat, with results not expected until later in the day. We'll be the first to get them to you.
The state of Wisconsin still provides the bulk of the company's earnings, at 48 per cent, down from 73 per cent in 2001. The strategy of increasing M&I's presence in high growth locales such as Arizona, the Gulf Coast of Florida and Nevada is paying off, according to Furlong.
Shareholder questions, entertained from the floor, included the annual query as to whether the firm plans to spin off its lucrative Metavante division, as had been proposed around the turn of the century in an offer later withdrawn. The answer, again, was "no." Kuester said the firm revisits the Metavante issue from time to time, and even brings in outside consultants to provide perspective. For the time being, the goose that is Metavante will remain in its coop in the bank's vault, laying golden eggs.
Refreshments included coffee, milk, orange juice and soft drinks. Pastries included various Danishes, cinnamon rolls and itsy-bitsy blueberry and poppyseed muffins. Thrifty shareholders stuffed their faces, and in some cases their pockets, with the morsels, prepared and served by Shully's Catering of Thiensville.
There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned.
-- Michael Horne