OTHER NEWS - March 2, 1995

Philip Morris Ends ‘Poison Pill’: The takeover defense, known formally as common share purchase rights and intended to make a hostile takeover prohibitively expensive, had been in place since 1989, when Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. led a record $25-billion takeover of RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp. No one has expressed interest in buying Philip Morris Cos., an official said. The board of the New York-based cigarette and packaged-foods company kept the firm’s regular dividend of 82.5 cents but added a special payment of 1 cent to redeem the poison pill under the terms of its adoption.