The Star Online: Business
The Star Online: Business |
- Maxis for sale?
- Khazanah confirms receiving summons, claim from Halim’s lawyers
- TNB continues to electrify
| Posted: 07 Jun 2013 05:38 PM PDT PETALING JAYA: Speculation that tycoon T Ananda Krishnan could be looking to sell his controlling stake in Kuala Lumpur-listed Maxis Bhd has surfaced, although not for the first time. The rumours arose a few months ago, but seem to have gained momentum following what is said to be a "house-cleaning" exercise at the telco, where seven senior executives, including its chief executive, have parted ways with the company just recently. More top management staff could be leaving, sources have said. Although close associates of Ananda have rebuffed the idea, saying that no such sale was taking place, other insiders are bandying about a figure of RM35bil as the price tag to purchase Ananda's effective stake of 29% in Maxis. Ananda owns 45% (via Usaha Tegas Sdn Bhd) in the telco's holding company, Maxis Communications Bhd, which, in turn, owns 64.4% in the listed Maxis. The other shareholders of Maxis Communications are Saudi Telecom Co (25%) and certain bumiputra shareholders (30%). Maxis is the country's largest mobile player by revenue and subscriber base and is in the midst of repositioning itself as an integrated player. The RM35bil price tag is more than double what the market values the stake at. Maxis' market capitalisation last Friday stood at RM50.6bil, giving Ananda's 29% stake a value of RM14.6bil. One of the names being linked to a possible acquisition of Ananda's stake in Maxis is Puncak Semangat, a new kid on the telco block which had won a block of 4G long-term evolution or LTE spectrum. It would make sense for any newcomer to the capital expenditure-intensive telco industry to acquire existing operators who have invested well in their networks. However, industry players said that it was unlikely that any one player in the market currently had that kind of firepower to acquire the controlling stake in Maxis. "You think anyone has that kind of money? I would dismiss the talk," said someone in the know. On the other hand, there are insiders who reckon that the time would come for Ananda to start looking at hiving off his major assets, especially when they are trading at a high value. "Ananda is 74 years old. Although in relatively good health, there isn't a family scion to take over the businesses. It only makes sense for him to start divesting assets and putting the cash into trusts for his family," said one corporate executive who used to work for one of Ananda's companies. Incidentally, Ananda is said to be taking a personal interest in the reorganisation underway at the top management of Maxis. There is also a plan to streamline operations and "flatten" its organisational structure. Aside from the seven top management personnel leaving the company, more are believed to be on their way out, considering that the reorganisation plans include reducing the 24 divisions at Maxis into less than half that number. "The idea is also to enhance accountability within the group," said a source. Maxis was expected to announce a new reorganisation structure early next week, the source added. |
| Khazanah confirms receiving summons, claim from Halim’s lawyers Posted: 07 Jun 2013 04:35 PM PDT PETALING JAYA: Khazanah Nasional Bhd has confirmed that Tan Sri Halim Saad was indeed suing it, confirming a StarBiz report earlier. In a short statement released yesterday, the sovereign wealth fund said it had received a Writ of Summons and Statement of Claim from the legal representatives of Halim. "We believe that we have a strong defence to the claim, and shall be taking all measures necessary to vigorously defend it in order to protect our interest," it said. In a StarBiz report yesterday, Halim alleged that he had not been paid the agreed RM1.3bil and given the tracts of land that had been agreed upon in a 2001 deal. He alleged that he was told not to exercise the "put option" but sell his shares to Khazanah instead. Halim, the former majority owner and executive chairman of Renong Bhd, filed a legal suit in April against those he claimed had forced him to sell his shares in the company. To recap, Renong, Malaysia's biggest conglomerate at one point of time, held a substantial stake in UEM, and in 1997, UEM announced that it had bought a 32.6% block of shares in Renong. However, this did not go down well with the investing public. To appease the market, Halim had, in 1998, offered to buy the Renong shares from UEM by way of a "put option". The option price for the "put" was RM3.2bil, which he was to pay in four instalments: three in RM100mil instalments and the balance with interest on Feb 14, 2001, when the option was due. Halim was reported to have paid the first RM100mil but could not pay up the second when it was due, which was when Khazanah took over. The sovereign wealth fund took UEM private in 2001 and later cancelled the option. Halim resigned from the Renong/UEM group in October 2001. |
| Posted: 07 Jun 2013 04:39 PM PDT PETALING JAYA: Despite having gained some 20% year-to-date, Tenaga Nasional Bhd's (TNB) shares continue to be on a roll, underpinned by its improving outlook and steady growth in electricity demand. The utility giant added four sen to close at RM8.29 yesterday. TNB shares have gained some 50 sen since the beginning of May 2013. According to Bloomberg data, 18 analysts have a "buy" rating on the counter, three a "hold" rating and only two a "sell" call. The consensus 12-month target price is RM8.89, while the consensus net profit for its financial year (FY) ending Aug 31, 2013 is RM3.58bil. In an initiative report, BIMB Securities Research sees the current transformation efforts within Peninsular Malaysia's electricity supply industry as one of the most significant events in TNB's history, as it could "transform" the utility's financial profile significantly, likely triggering a subsequent stock re-rating by the market. The research outfit has a "trading buy" call on TNB, with a target price of RM8.96. "While undoubtedly its improved financial performance over the previous quarters have helped in contributing to its share price uptrend, which has gained 33% over the past 12 months, we believe materialisation of the sector's reform would be the most critical factor for TNB to break away from its record high of RM9.39, recorded almost 20 years back," it said. "The proposed introduction of incentive based regulatory or IBR and the implementation of the automated fuel cost pass-through mechanism, together with a more competitive power generation sector, are seen as important factors required in establishing a sustainable power sector in Peninsular Malaysia and to rationalise the Government's subsidy for the sector. "While taking a view at this juncture remains a challenging task, the sector would have to endure strong reforms to break away from current predicaments," BIMB Securities stated. It also reckoned that TNB stood a "very good chance" of securing at least one of the ongoing plant-up programme tenders by the Energy Commission, with a combined capacity of 3GW. TNB is currently bidding for two new coal-fired power plants of 1,000MW (Project 3A) and 2x1,000MW (Project 3B). Additionally, BIMB Securities said TNB was also at various planning stages to bring up to approximately 1GW of hydro generation capacity. Given the group's ongoing capacity expansion programmes, which represent 73% of all ongoing plant-up exercises in Peninsular Malaysia, BIMB Securities expects the group to retain its dominance in the generation segment. By end-2016, it expects the group's effective installed capacity to account for 57% of total installed capacity in the Peninsula. "With the expectation of gross domestic product growing around the 5% range this and next year, we forecast a demand growth of 4.7% and 4.3% in FY13 and FY14."
|
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Star Online: Business To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 ulasan:
Catat Ulasan