SGX grants 13 firms three-month MTP extension
A lucky 13 companies on the Singapore Exchange (SGX)
mainboard have been given a three-month reprieve from being assessed for
compliance with SGX's minimum trading price (MTP) rule, with no company being
sent to the watch-list due to MTP in the June round of review.
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Melissa Tan
03 June 2016
A lucky 13 companies on the Singapore Exchange (SGX) mainboard have been given a three-month reprieve from being assessed for compliance with SGX's minimum trading price (MTP) rule, with no company being sent to the watch-list due to MTP in the June round of review.
The extension for these firms' MTP review from June to September comes after they were "affected by recent market volatility", the bourse said in a press release on Thursday. It noted that all 13 saw their six-month volume-weighted average price (VWAP) dip below the S$0.20 MTP in recent months.
SGX's move comes three months after the MTP rule took effect at the start of March this year, and brings the number of companies granted extensions until Sept 1 up to 39 in total. The exchange had said last December that firms that consolidated their shares before March 1, 2016, would have another six months before being assessed for MTP compliance. It reviews mainboard-listed companies for MTP compliance every three months starting March 1, 2016.
The companies that got an extension for MTP compliance from June until Sept 1 included a significant number of offshore and marine firms. The 13 are Ban Leong Technologies, China Gaoxian Fibre Fabric Holdings, Falcon Energy Group, King Wan Corp, KrisEnergy, KS Energy, Mirach Energy, OKH Global, Parkson Retail Asia, Ramba Energy, Sunvic Chemical Holdings, Swissco Holdings and Vard Holdings.
SGX said in its statement that two of these firms were already on the watch-list for financial criteria based on profitability and market value. They were China Gaoxian and Mirach Energy, according to SGX's watch-list Web page. Setting those two aside, 41 mainboard-listed companies are now on the watch-list for failing to meet the MTP, it noted, adding that all companies that go on the MTP watch-list from March 3, 2016, have three years to take steps to boost their share price such that their six-month VWAP will be at least S$0.20.
The bourse has had exploratory discussions with industry professionals about merging the MTP watch-list and financial watch-list into one, The Business Times reported in February. But SGX has yet to reveal its decision.
It said on Thursday that another three companies will join the "financial" watch-list on June 3. These are Blumont Group, Innopac Holdings and Lafe Corporation. Attilan Group, formerly known as Asiasons Capital, would also have been sent to the watch-list for financial criteria if it had not already been placed there for failure to meet MTP.