Up to 12,000 Guinness shareholders in Ireland will benefit from a special £2.8 billion payout as part of the group's merger with GrandMet. As part of the £24 billion merger, the enlarged group, to be known as Diageo, is planning a capital repayment to investors.

Details of the capital repayment - worth 70p for each Guinness and GrandMet share - are included in new documents being posted to shareholders.

A spokesman for Guinness, Ireland, said that around 11,00012,000 people in the Republic hold shares in Guinness. Among these were employees who had availed of share purchase and profit-sharing schemes, he said.

He said Guinness employees were active buyers of shares and watched the group's share price very closely, which was "an indication of the level of interest in shares".

The merger has already been approved by European competition authorities and is awaiting approval in the US and the agreement of shareholders.

Guinness and GrandMet said they were hopeful of a satisfactory agreement with the US anti-trust authorities.

Shareholder meetings to vote on the mergers will be held on November 26th and dealings in new Diageo shares will begin on December 17th.