Sindora’s shares suspended with Kulim’s stake at 96.3%

KUALA LUMPUR: Trading in the shares of Sindora Bhd is suspended from today, pending the approval for its de-listing.

Its parent Kulim (M) Bhd and parties acting in concert with it controls 92.48 million shares or 96.33% of Sindora as at Oct 3, up from 77.5% they had when its privatisation offer was made in August.

“Subject to Kulim obtaining the approval from the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (Miti) for the offer which is still pending, the offeror will procure Sindora to apply to Bursa Securities for withdrawal of Sindora’s listing status,” it said in a statement yesterday.

Sindora closed unchanged at RM3.09 yesterday with 42,300 shares done. That’s a shade below Kulim’s revised offer of RM3.10 apiece, up from RM3 when the offer was first made, after Kulim paid RM3.10 apiece to buy a block of 10.2 million shares or an 11% stake off-market.

Sindora minority shareholders have until Oct 18 to accept Kulim’s offer, unless an extension is made. Kulim would only have the right to compulsorily acquire all shares from dissenting shareholders if it receives valid acceptances from holders with 90% of the 24.5% of Sindora it did not already own when making the offer. Kulim would need to hold 99.55% of Sindora for that to happen, back-of-the-envelope calculations show.

The privatisation of Sindora is part of Kulim’s and its parent company, Johor Corp’s (JCorp) move to streamline its businesses and assets into distinct business units. JCorp is also in the midst of disposing its plantation assets to Kulim for RM700 million cash, an exercise which is expected to help JCorp raise cash to pare its RM3.6 billion debt. Observers note that Kulim is essentially looking at Sindora’s oil palm plantation estate in Kluang, Johor to boost its plantation landbank. Kulim currently has some 34,414ha of plantations.