Many large companies are doing well, despite the corona crisis.
As companies now begin to present their financial statements for 2020, both Sandvik and Investor have shown strong results.
In addition to the ordinary share dividend of SEK 5.6 billion, Sandvik wants to give an extra SEK 2.5 billion - partly as compensation for the fact that there was no dividend last year.
Tightening of rules may await
This causes the Minister of Finance to react.
- It is important not to distribute too much now that the economy is uncertain, so you do not have to ask for support later, says Magdalena Andersson to SVT News.
At the same time, she is opening up to tighten the regulations.
Already this spring, the text of the law was changed after SVT's revelation that several large companies made dividends but at the same time would receive state support for their redundancies.
So in 2020, companies have been forced to choose - layoffs or share dividends.
Companies that wanted to pay dividends, such as SKF, chose to say no to the aid.
Sandvik chose to receive SEK 300 million in support.
Last week, Sandvik's CEO Stefan Widing told SVT that the conclusion that Sandvik could afford layoffs on its own behalf, was easy to draw afterwards.
- We did not know that then in April, but that is also why we did not seek support in the fourth quarter when we see that the result is starting to go better.
Ex-post evaluation
This spring, many companies - and the government - thought it was important to pay out aid quickly.
They wanted to avoid companies notifying and dismissing employees.
Magdalena Andersson now believes that it could be a change for the future that one examines in retrospect how a company has coped with a crisis, and then decides whether support money should be paid back.
- This is not how the rules are designed today, but it is one of the questions we will have with us in the future, when we see how we will work in the future.