Stocks to watch: Keppel, ComfortDelGro, The Hour Glass, Asia Vets, Alset

THE following companies saw new developments that may affect trading of their securities on Friday (Dec 31):

Keppel, ComfortDelGro and The Hour Glass: BN4  C52 AGS  Transport operator ComfortDelGro and luxury watch retailer The Hour Glass separately announced on Thursday that they will be redesignating their independent directors (IDs) as non-independent directors from Jan 1, 2022. Mainboard-listed Keppel also announced that it would redesignate its independent chairman as non-independent chairman. This comes after a hard term limit of 9 years for IDs written into the Singapore Exchange Listing Rules back in August 2018 is set to come into effect on Jan 1, 2022. Shares of ComfortDelGro closed flat at S$1.40, while Keppel shares closed down 1.2 per cent or S$0.06 at S$5.11 and The Hour Glass shares closed at S$2.06, up 1.5 per cent or S$0.03 on Thursday, before the announcements were made.

Asia Vets: 5RE The Catalist-listed veterinary services company said in a bourse filing on Thursday that it has entered into a sale and purchase agreement to acquire 100 per cent of the ordinary shares in Aldigi, a fintech company, which will result in a reverse takeover. As part of the proposed acquisition, Asia Vets will pay S$45 million by issuing 335.4 million new ordinary shares at S$0.13415 per share for Aldigi's shares. Asia Vets shares last traded at S$0.05 on Dec 29, before it called for a trading halt on Thursday morning. Its shares resume trading on Friday.

Alset International: 40V The Catalist-listed property investment and development company said it will subscribe to 190 shares in Alset Metaverse for US$0.19 each, representing 19 per cent of the total number of issued shares of Alset Metaverse. The balance will be subscribed by Alset EHome International. Alset International said that it will incubate and invest in metaverse-related projects through Alset Metaverse. Its shares closed at S$0.05, down S$0.001 or 2 per cent on Thursday before the announcement was made.

Trading halts: The respective boards of directors of Mapletree Commercial Trust (MCT) N2IU and Mapletree North Asia Commercial Trust (MNACT) RW 0U a nnounced in a bourse filing on Friday morning the proposed merger of both real estate investment trusts (Reits). The proposed merger is to be effected through the acquisition by MCT of all the issued and paid-up units of MNACT by way of a trust scheme of arrangement. Both Reits called for a trading halt on Dec 28, pending the release of an announcement. Units of MCT closed flat at S$2 while MNACT ended unchanged at S$1.11 on Dec 27. 

Metech International V 3M has called for a trading halt on Friday morning, pending the release of an announcement. Its shares closed at S$0.35, down S$0.01 or 2.8 per cent on Thursday.