KUALA LUMPUR: Trading for yesterday’s top gainer Emico Holdings Bhd’s stock was suspended but not before the stock almost doubled in value.
The penny stock jumped 97.5% from 20 sen to 39.5 sen in 4½ hours of trading before trading was halted at 3.35pm.
The price spike, which began at 9.26am, saw a total of 89.36 million shares traded. The traded volume amounted to a significant 93% of Emico’s issued share capital of 95.93 million shares.
The controlling Lim family and two other shareholders collectively own about 36% of the company, according to its 2010 annual report.
As at April 29, the Lim family collectively held about 21.5% of the company, while Affin Bank Bhd held 7.4% and Danaharta Urus Sdn Bhd owned 7.3%.
The company is headed by executive chairman Lim Teik Hian.
Emico was the fifth most actively traded counter on Bursa Malaysia yesterday. Prior to yesterday’s surge in volume, its year-to-date average daily traded volume was just 17,010 shares.
Bursa had queried Emico earlier yesterday about the unusual jump in its share price and volume. Emico’s board of directors managed to respond on the same day before the suspension of the trading of the stock and announced that they were unaware of the cause of the unusual market activity (UMA).
The company is involved in the manufacture of trophies, trading of furniture and property development.
For the financial year ended Dec 31, 2010, it posted a net profit of RM1.05 million, down from RM1.25 million in FY09. For the first six months of 2011, Emico slipped into the red with a net loss of RM585,000.
Another company that was queried for UMA yesterday was Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd, which rose 1.96% to 78 sen on the back of 63.11 million shares traded to be the sixth most active counter. The traded volume represented 15.09% of Hibiscus’ total issued shares.
The UMA query came a few hours into trading when Hibiscus’ share price climbed 2.6% to a record 78.5 sen at 11.32am following a 17.7% jump on Tuesday.
Hibiscus warrants topped the most actively traded list with 1.62 billion units.
The oil and gas special purpose acquisition company (Spac) had agreed to buy a 35% stake in Lime Petroleum Plc for US$55 million (RM171.05 million) last month.
It responded to Bursa’s query, highlighting the Lime Petroleum deal and crude oil futures hitting a 3-month high on Nov 7 of above US$95 per barrel, as possible reasons for the surge in the price and trading volume of its shares.
Another penny stock that made huge gains was Dataprep Holdings Bhd which rose sharply by 75% to 42 sen from 24 sen on a volume of 91.49 million shares, which represented 23.99% of its total issued shares. The IT company was the fourth most actively traded stock yesterday.
On a broader note, penny stocks made up 24 of the 28 most actively traded stocks by volume on the local exchange yesterday. With the exception of Harvest Court Industries Bhd, the top 28 percentage gainers in the market yesterday were also all penny stocks, with a share price of less than RM1 each.
An analyst pointed out that this was indicative of the highly speculative behaviour in the market with some investors trying to take advantage of the low-price and small-cap stocks to make huge margins.
Meanwhile, Harvest Court continued its ascent, gaining 22.88% to close at RM1.45 yesterday with 24.21 million shares traded.
The top five gainers yesterday were Emico (97.5%), followed by Dataprep Holdings Bhd (75%), Edaran Bhd (36.67%), PUC Founder MSC Bhd (33.33%) and LFE Corp Bhd (30.43%).
This article appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, November 10, 2011.
The penny stock jumped 97.5% from 20 sen to 39.5 sen in 4½ hours of trading before trading was halted at 3.35pm.
The price spike, which began at 9.26am, saw a total of 89.36 million shares traded. The traded volume amounted to a significant 93% of Emico’s issued share capital of 95.93 million shares.
The controlling Lim family and two other shareholders collectively own about 36% of the company, according to its 2010 annual report.
As at April 29, the Lim family collectively held about 21.5% of the company, while Affin Bank Bhd held 7.4% and Danaharta Urus Sdn Bhd owned 7.3%.
The company is headed by executive chairman Lim Teik Hian.
Emico was the fifth most actively traded counter on Bursa Malaysia yesterday. Prior to yesterday’s surge in volume, its year-to-date average daily traded volume was just 17,010 shares.
Bursa had queried Emico earlier yesterday about the unusual jump in its share price and volume. Emico’s board of directors managed to respond on the same day before the suspension of the trading of the stock and announced that they were unaware of the cause of the unusual market activity (UMA).
The company is involved in the manufacture of trophies, trading of furniture and property development.
For the financial year ended Dec 31, 2010, it posted a net profit of RM1.05 million, down from RM1.25 million in FY09. For the first six months of 2011, Emico slipped into the red with a net loss of RM585,000.
Another company that was queried for UMA yesterday was Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd, which rose 1.96% to 78 sen on the back of 63.11 million shares traded to be the sixth most active counter. The traded volume represented 15.09% of Hibiscus’ total issued shares.
The UMA query came a few hours into trading when Hibiscus’ share price climbed 2.6% to a record 78.5 sen at 11.32am following a 17.7% jump on Tuesday.
Hibiscus warrants topped the most actively traded list with 1.62 billion units.
The oil and gas special purpose acquisition company (Spac) had agreed to buy a 35% stake in Lime Petroleum Plc for US$55 million (RM171.05 million) last month.
It responded to Bursa’s query, highlighting the Lime Petroleum deal and crude oil futures hitting a 3-month high on Nov 7 of above US$95 per barrel, as possible reasons for the surge in the price and trading volume of its shares.
Another penny stock that made huge gains was Dataprep Holdings Bhd which rose sharply by 75% to 42 sen from 24 sen on a volume of 91.49 million shares, which represented 23.99% of its total issued shares. The IT company was the fourth most actively traded stock yesterday.
On a broader note, penny stocks made up 24 of the 28 most actively traded stocks by volume on the local exchange yesterday. With the exception of Harvest Court Industries Bhd, the top 28 percentage gainers in the market yesterday were also all penny stocks, with a share price of less than RM1 each.
An analyst pointed out that this was indicative of the highly speculative behaviour in the market with some investors trying to take advantage of the low-price and small-cap stocks to make huge margins.
Meanwhile, Harvest Court continued its ascent, gaining 22.88% to close at RM1.45 yesterday with 24.21 million shares traded.
The top five gainers yesterday were Emico (97.5%), followed by Dataprep Holdings Bhd (75%), Edaran Bhd (36.67%), PUC Founder MSC Bhd (33.33%) and LFE Corp Bhd (30.43%).
This article appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, November 10, 2011.
