Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the distribution of Polestar shares to Volvo Cars shareholders conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be the question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you need to press star one one on your telephone keypad. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw a question, please press star one one again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to our speaker today, John Hernander. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Nadia. Good morning, and welcome to this 30-minute call with Volvo Cars, where we are to discuss the proposed distribution of shares in Polestar to Volvo Cars shareholders. With me today, I have our Chief Financial Officer, Johan Ekdahl, who will give you a short presentation. After that, we will be happy to open up for any questions and answer the questions that you have. But for now, let me hand over to our CFO, Johan Ekdahl. Johan, please go ahead.
Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. Yeah, a short presentation before we take the Q&A then. Well, as you know, on February first, we announced the evaluation of a potential adjustment of our shareholding in Polestar, including potential distribution of shares to our shareholders, which we have now—the board has now decided to propose. This is to allow us to concentrate our resources on the next stage of our transformation, ramping up production and, in a period of high investments, to lead in next-generation mobility and further sharpening our focus on Volvo Cars' own journey. And as such, we will also not provide further funding into Polestar.
The board has then decided to make a significant reduction of our shareholding in Polestar from 48%-18% of the capital, or 15% of the votes, or 638.5 million shares. And, as we have significant operational collaborations still with Polestar and the financial relationships, we also feel that it makes sense for us to retain certain influence through a smaller stake in Polestar also, for the time being going forward. And, after this distribution, Geely Holding will continue to provide operational and financial support to Polestar.
And we also think that it's makes sense in the journey where Polestar are right now, coming up with a couple of new cars and on the revised business plan, that they are part of the Geely Holding ecosystem, being a holding company structure, rather than us being a standalone one-brand operational car company. So that makes sense for all parties involved. And also, as Polestar has communicated, they are well progressed on a financing plan to provide the remaining of the funding required, including additional external debt and equity. So, and hence, as I said, Volvo Cars will therefore, going forward, not provide further funding to Polestar, but concentrate our resources on the next phase of our own transformation.
Volvo Cars and Polestar's strong operational collaboration across research and development, manufacturing of cars, after sales, and in different commercial areas, will continue to the benefit of both companies going forward. If we look a little bit shortly on the transaction structure, which is then that, there will be a decision then or a proposed decision on the AGM on March twenty-sixth on this distribution, and then it technically will be done by a share split in Volvo Cars. Then we will have a common share and a so-called redemption share, and that redemption share will then be traded on the Nasdaq Stockholm stock exchange in the period from the fifteenth of April to the thirtieth of April 2024.
As a shareholder, you can actively choose to keep Redemption Shares and receive the SDRs or sell Redemption Shares and receive cash. After that period, the Redemption Shares are redeemed for SDRs. These will then have a three-month conversion period, and the reason for that is that, due to the fact that some. The equal treatment of shareholders, if you will, because the, a small minority of the Volvo Cars shareholders are direct holders of the share rather than through other, I mean, capital insurances or investment accounts, et cetera. And that means that they need to take certain active action in order to be able to hold the Polestar shares, which means that that's. And hence, the three-month conversion period. And after that period, these SDRs may be converted into Polestar ADSs.
That can be, of course, done earlier, if you, depending on the way that you're holding the Volvo Cars shares today. That's more. So, the relatively complex technical structure is then due to, of course, the fact that Polestar is a U.S.-listed company. And high-level preliminary timetable is then, today, we did the announcement in connection with the notice to the AGM. Then on the fifth of March, there will be a publication of an information brochure and some other information. This is also in connection with the publication of our annual report in then three weeks before the AGM. The AGM then takes place March twenty-sixth, with a decision on the proposed distribution. And then following the time plan, the record date for the share split is April twelfth.
Then we have the trading period for the redemption shares on Nasdaq Stockholm, April 15 to April 30. The SDRs are planned to be distributed on May 13th, and then there is this three-month conversion period, and then the SDR program is planned to be terminated mid-August. So that follows then the transaction structure showed on the previous slide. So with that short presentation, I'll leave back to you, John, again.
Thank you, Johan. That makes us ready to start the question and answer session. I hand it over to Nadia again to go through the practicalities once again. Please, Nadia.
Thank you so much. Dear participants, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone keypad and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw a question, please press star one one again. Please stand by, we'll compile the Q&A roster. This will take a few moments. Now we're going to take our first question. It comes from the line of Pushkar Tondwalkar from HSBC. Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I have a couple. The first one, your press release mentions that you keep the 18% capital stake in Polestar for influence. If you could just elaborate on what could that mean in terms of influence? And then a follow-up just related to that. You retain the 18% stake, and you also have said that you would not fund Polestar anymore. So any further potential capital raise at Polestar, can you confirm that Volvo won't participate in it and let its stake in Polestar get diluted further down from that 18%? Thanks.
Yes, thank you. On the first question, on the influence, I think, I mean, we have a board, we have board representation today. Our CEO, Jim Rowan, is on the board. That is, he will remain there. So, and I guess to have a certain influence, as an example, a board seat then requires a certain ownership. So I think that hopefully answers the question. And I guess considering that we have there's a lot of collaboration, industrially and in manufacturing, et cetera. We also have the financial corporations. We have the shareholder loan, et cetera, which means that we think that it's a logical, or the board has also evaluated that it's a logical step to have certain influence over Polestar, despite not funding them.
On your second question, yes, I can confirm there are no intentions to participate in fundraising. We will accept dilution in such a case.
Thank you.
Thank you. Now we're going to take our next question. Just give us a moment. The question comes to line of Alexandre Raverdy from Kepler Cheuvreux. Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Thanks for the call. Just a confirmation on the accounting treatment of the remaining 18% stake. Will there be any change, or will it still be equity accounted?
Again, it may be a little bit early to finally determine that, but in my, yeah, as we, as I said, we have an 18% stake, and we have a board seat, so I would foresee that it's very likely that it will still be treated as an associated company, despite the fact that we no longer have the as high an ownership and not funding them and have that responsibility as an owner. It will rather be an associated company where we have operational partnerships.
Understood. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Dear participants, as a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone keypad. Dear speakers, there are no further questions at this time. I would now like to hand the conference over to John Hernander for any closing remarks.
All right. Thank you, Nadia. That concludes then today's presentation around the proposed distribution of shares in Polestar to Volvo Car shareholders. Just as, as a notice as well, there are more details about the proposal also in the AGM notice that have been published today. But as always, if you want to follow up on any questions, just reach out to us in the investor relations team. And with that, we wish you a good day, and have a nice weekend when it comes. Goodbye.
Bye.
That does, that does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now all disconnect. Have a nice day. The speakers, please stand by.