KUALA LUMPUR (Oct 21): The Employees Provident Fund (EPF) has re-emerged as the substantial shareholder in TIME dotCom Bhd, with total shareholdings of 30.21 million shares or a 5.249% stake.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia today, the telecommunications group said EPF acquired the 30.21 million shares last Friday (Oct 16) in the open market. The transaction price for the shares was not disclosed.

It is worth pointing out that the provident fund had been slowly reducing its stake in TIME dotCom since last month. It ceased to be a substantial shareholder of the company after disposing of some 5.77 million shares on the open market, which is equivalent to a 1% equity stake on Oct 12.

For the second quarter ended June 30, 2015, TIME dotCom's net profit increased sevenfold to RM315.43 million, from RM44 million in the previous year, while revenue rose 5% to RM163.77 million, from RM155.74 million.

For the six months to June 30, net profit stood at RM372.01 million, compared to RM73.42 million a year earlier, while revenue climbed 17% to RM335.48 million, from RM287.62 million in the previous year.

TIME dotCom's shares gained five sen or 0.74% to close at RM6.80 today, for a market capitalisation of RM3.85 billion.

(Note: The Edge Research's fundamental score reflects a company's profitability and balance sheet strength, calculated based on historical numbers. The valuation score determines if a stock is attractively valued or not, also based on historical numbers. A score of 3 suggests strong fundamentals and attractive valuations.)