Thursday 28 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (April 4): Based on corporate announcements and newsflow today, stocks that could be in focus tomorrow (April 5) include Lysaght Galvanized Steel Bhd, Seacera Group Bhd, Bertam Alliance Bhd, Datasonic Group Bhd and Hiap Teck Venture Bhd.

Lysaght Galvanized Steel Bhd has confirmed that CKH and LIK Family Sdn Bhd have emerged as its ultimate holding company, with an aggregate stake of 74.2%.

Lysaght said it was notified of the change today, which confirms a report by The Edge Malaysia weekly in its Jan 15 edition.

According to the report, CKH and LIK Family are jointly owned by Annie Chew Meu Jong (eldest daughter of the group’s founder Chew Kar Heing), her mother Lim Iee Kuan, her daughter Deborah Ho Mun Sook and uncle Chew Kar Hoo.

Lysaght, the report noted, was 55.14%-controlled by Lysaght (M) Sdn Bhd, which in turn was 51.63%-owned by Chew Bros (M) Sdn Bhd. Chew Bros was thus the ultimate holding company of Lysaght.

But CKH and LIK Family has now emerged as the ultimate holding company, following a transfer of shares in Chew Bros by the estate of Kar Heing and his widow Lim. This raised its stake in Chew Bros to 74.2% from 42.8%.

CKH and LIK Family has now emerged as the ultimate holding company, following a transfer of shares in Chew Bros by the estate of Kar Heing and his widow Lim. This raised its stake in Chew Bros to 74.2% from 42.8%.

The Edge weekly also reported that certain quarters are of the view that a mandatory general offer would have been triggered when CKH and LIK Family had raised its stake in Chew Bros to above 50%.

Seacera Group Bhd has cancelled its plan to acquire a 70% stake in construction and civil engineering firm Teras Sari Resources Sdn Bhd, shortly after announcing it on Feb 22.

"On behalf of the board, KAF Investment Bank wishes to announce that the company and the vendors had, via exchange of letters dated April 3, and April 4, 2018, mutually agreed to terminate the share sale agreement," its bourse filing read today.

On Feb 22, the group announced that its wholly-owned unit Seacera Builders Sdn Bhd signed a heads of agreement to acquire the stake from LT Century Development Sdn Bhd and LTC Holdings Sdn Bhd.

Seacera had said it would pay RM35 million for the stake, via the issuance of 35 million new Seacera shares, at an issue price of RM1 each.

Additionally, Seacera has been publicly reprimanded by Bursa Malaysia Securities Bhd today for failing to account for adjustments in the group’s quarterly report for the financial year ended Dec 31, 2016 (QR Dec 2016) that was announced on Feb 28, 2017, which contravened the exchange’s Main Market Listing Requirements (LR).

“The adjustments were mainly in respect of the non-allocation of loss of a subsidiary to the non-controlling interest and the company had acknowledged that the adjustments should have been made in the QR Dec 2016,” Bursa Malaysia said.

Bursa Malaysia explained that Seacera had reported an unaudited profit attributable to the owners of the company of RM4.5 million in its QR Dec 2016 compared to an audited profit attributable to owners of the company of RM6.1 million in the audited financial statements for the financial year ended Dec 31, 2016 announced on April 28, 2017.

The difference of RM1.594 million represented a variance of 35%.

Meanwhile, Bertam Alliance Bhd has been classified as an affected listed issuer under Practice Note 17 (PN17) as Bursa Malaysia has rejected its application for a waiver.

The company said the bourse made its decision after taking into consideration the winding-up order against its wholly-owned unit Bertam Development Sdn Bhd (BDSB), which accounts for at least 50% of the company’s total assets.

Although BDSB had appealed against the winding-up order, it said there is no certainty that the order can be set aside in the near future.

Datasonic Group Bhd said the pioneeer status of its wholly-owned unit, Datasonic Smart Solutions Sdn Bhd, has been extended for another five years.

The group’s subsidiary’s statutory income from approved activities is thus exempted from tax during the period which took effect on May 18, 2017 and ends on May 17, 2022.

The extension is expected to contribute positively to the financial results of the group, said Datasonic.

Hiap Teck Venture Bhd today said it is disposing of a 20% stake in Eastern Steel Sdn Bhd to Shanxi Jianlong Industry Co Ltd for RM139.3 million, a move it said could potentially bring about a "successful turnaround".

Eastern Steel is principally involved in manufacturing, selling, and dealing of steel products using blast furnace plant, but operations had halted since October 2015 to minimise losses due to difficult market conditions.

It was a joint venture company in which Hiap Teck, Orient Steel Investment Pte Ltd and Chinaco Investment Pte Ltd held 55%, 40% and 5% equity shareholdings respectively.

Today Hiap Teck said it is paring down its stake from 55% to 35% by way of equity and debt transfer, to China-based steel producer Jianlong.

The agreement signed on April 3 also includes the disposal of shareholders' advances made by Hiap Teck to Eastern Steel, which totalled RM625.6 million as at Feb 28.

 

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