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This article first appeared in Capital, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on December 31, 2019 - January 6, 2020

WITH only about 20% of the companies on Bursa Malaysia having chalked up gains in 2018, it was astonishing to see the share price of cashless payments solutions provider Revenue Group Bhd, which was listed only in July, jump 270.3% from its offer price of 37 sen to close at RM1.37 on Dec 21.

As for the big caps, Supermax Corp Bhd was one of the best performers, recording a total year-to-date (up to Dec 21) return of 80.3%, thanks to better financial results on higher sales from additional production and improved operational efficiency.

In the super big cap space, consumer-related stocks such as QL Resources Bhd and Nestlé (M) Bhd were the top gainers with a total return of 50.1% and 45.8% YTD respectively. Top Glove Corp Bhd, which became an FBM KLCI constituent in the index’s year-end review, also saw an impressive total return of 39% YTD. This was despite the glove manufacturer suing Adventa Capital Pte Ltd and two directors of Aspion Sdn Bhd — Low Chin Guan and Wong Chin Toh — for RM714.9 million on claims that the directors were in a conspiracy to defraud the company by tricking it into acquiring Aspion for RM1.37 billion. Recall that in January, Top Glove agreed to buy surgical glovemaker Aspion from Adventa Capital and pay for it in a combination of RM1.23 billion cash and RM137 million from the issuance of 20.51 million new Top Glove shares at RM6.68 apiece. In a conference call with analysts, Top Glove alleged that Aspion’s management distorted the company’s financial statements.

The top losers on Bursa in 2018 were companies that were affected by some of the changes post-GE14. Telekom Malaysia Bhd’s share price fell 56.5% YTD, followed by Genting Malaysia Bhd (-44%), Genting Bhd (-30.1%) and Axiata Group Bhd (-28.2%). The telcos were hurt by the reforms undertaken by new Communications and Multimedia Minister Gobind Singh Deo to achieve broadband connections that are “double the speed, half the price” for Malaysians while the gaming stocks were hit by the tax hikes announced in Budget 2019.

Oil and gas counters dominated the top-losers table in the small cap, mid cap and large cap space as seen by the decline in Daya Materials Bhd, Scomi Group Bhd, Barakah Offshore Petroleum Bhd, Bumi Armada Bhd, Hengyuan Refining Co Bhd and Sapura Energy Bhd.

The average total loss of all the listed companies on Bursa in 2018 (as at Dec 21) was 23.8%.

 

 

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