POW: Results 4Q08

Power Corporation has announced:

Power Financial Corporation’s operating earnings for the year ended December 31, 2008 were $1,974 million or $2.69 per share, compared with $2,082 million or $2.84 per share in 2007.

Other items, not included in operating earnings, were a net charge of $637 million or $0.90 per share in 2008, compared with a net charge of $38 million or $0.05 in 2007. Other items in 2008 consisted of Power Financial’s share of non-recurring items recorded by Lifeco, IGM and Pargesa. The main components of other items in 2008 were the write-down of intangibles assets
and goodwill relating to the acquisition of Putnam in 2007 ($983 million), the gain from the sale of health business at Great-West Life & Annuity ($472 milion), and the write-down of Pargesa’s investments in Lafarge and Pernod Ricard ($328 million for 2008).

As a result, net earnings were $1,337 million or $1.79 per share in 2008, compared with $2,044 million or $2.79 per share in 2007.

About three-quarters of net consolidated annual earnings were derived from Great-West Lifeco.

Power Corp. issues tracked by HIMIPref™ are POW.PR.A, POW.PR.B, POW.PR.C, POW.PR.D and POW.PR.F. The first four are included in the PerpetualDiscount Subindex; POW.PR.F has been relegated to “Scraps” on volume concerns.

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