China Haida fails to get SGX nod for S$3.3m rights issue

MAINBOARD-LISTED China Haida is scrapping its planned rights issue that could have raised net proceeds of about S$3.3 million, after failing to get the green light from the Singapore Exchange (SGX). 

The SGX informed watch-listed China Haida on Monday that it is unable to approve the rights issue, due to concerns raised in the Trade With Caution Notice the bourse issued last week. 

In the notice, SGX RegCo highlighted that on Dec 16, the share price of China Haida had surged 150 per cent to S$0.01, while the on-market volume had spiked to over four million shares. 

China Haida's trading volume up to Jan 6 remained high at an average daily level of about 1.7 million shares, but in the three months prior, the counter had only three active trading days with a total volume of 576,000 shares. 

Notably, trades by a small group of participants accounted for a significant portion of activity between Dec 16 and Jan 6, according to a SGX RegCo review of the trading activity. SGX RegCo said that it will refer the case to statutory authorities where required.

China Haida had first proposed the rights issue back in June 2019, but on Dec 17 had proposed issuing seven rights shares for every existing share, instead of eight rights shares, at an unchanged issue price of S$0.002. 

China Haida shares closed flat at S$0.009 on Monday.