KUALA LUMPUR (May 19): In a rare update, Top Glove Corp Bhd said the world’s largest rubber glove maker’s foreign shareholding has been stable at around 35%, after Bursa Malaysia indicated that foreign investors were net sellers of Top Glove shares in April 2022, following net purchases in the preceding two months.

"Our foreign shareholding has been stable at around the 35% range,”  Top Glove said in a statement on Thursday (May 19), in response to theedgemarkets.com's enquiries.

On Tuesday (May 17), Bursa’s research arm Bursa Digital Research said in a note that Top Glove topped the list of net sell stocks by foreign investors in terms of value on Bursa in April 2022.

"Foreign investors net disposed of -RM63 mil (worth of Top Glove shares) in April (2022), after increasing its position for the past two months. 

"Meanwhile, local institutions turned net buyers after selling for the past three months. Local retailer (retail investors) added +RM37 mil to its portfolio,” Bursa Digital Research said.

At 35%, Top Glove’s foreign shareholding appears to be the highest among several FBM KLCI constituents tracked by the theedgemarkets.com within the 30-stock KLCI.

The KLCI constituents tracked include Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank), CIMB Group Holdings Bhd, Axiata Group Bhd and Sime Darby Plantation Bhd, all of which provide regular updates on their foreign shareholdings on their respective websites.

Maybank stated that its foreign shareholding as at April 30, 2022 stood at 17.64%, while rival financial services provider CIMB said its foreign shareholding stood at 25.3% as at April 2022.

Axiata stated that its foreign shareholding was recorded at 10.9% as at March 2022, while Sime Darby Plantation indicated that its foreign shareholding stood at 10.31% as at April 28, 2022.

Unlike these KLCI constituents, Top Glove does not announce its foreign shareholding on the company's website.

Top Glove also did not elaborate on its foreign shareholding in its one-sentence statement to the theedgemarkets.com.

Top Glove, which is listed on Bursa Malaysia and the Singapore Exchange, is the world’s largest rubber glove manufacturer by production capacity.

According to Top Glove's latest investor presentation, the company has an annual production capacity of 100 billion pieces of gloves as of May 2022.

Top Glove, which has a workforce of over 22,000 employees, said it has 49 factories, comprising 32 glove manufacturing facilities in Malaysia, three in Thailand and one each in China and Vietnam, as well as 12 non-glove factories.

Looking back, Top Glove was closely watched as a beneficiary of the Covid-19 outbreak which started in early 2020, as demand for rubber gloves, seen as a crucial personal protective equipment, surged to curb the global spread of Covid-19.

However, Covid-19-driven demand for gloves is now seen normalising as global vaccination progress leads to anticipation that the Covid-19 outbreak can be curbed.

Such sentiment is reflected in Top Glove's share price, which has been adjusted for its two-for-one bonus share issue under which about 5.4 billion new shares were listed and quoted on Bursa and the Singapore Exchange on Sept 7, 2020, according to the company's Bursa filing on that day.

On Thursday, Top Glove’s share price closed down eight sen or 5.23% at RM1.45, valuing the group at about RM11.61 billion.

Top Glove has 8.01 billion outstanding shares.

According to Top Glove’s Bursa filing on Thursday, Top Glove executive chairman Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai had raised his direct stake in the company to 27.417%, after he acquired one million Top Glove shares on Thursday at RM1.47 each.

Lim also owns an indirect stake of 8.495% in Top Glove, according to Top Glove, which is also a constituent of Bursa’s Health Care Index.