Hyflux now has just S$21.5 million in cash: source

[SINGAPORE] Singaporean company Hyflux, which was put under judicial management last month, now has only about S$21.5 million in cash, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The amount is enough to last at least 10 months, the person said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private.

The news means this is at least the second year in which liquidity at the water treatment company has more than halved.

It had S$44.6 million in cash and equivalents at the end of 2019, compared with about S$92 million on Dec 31, 2018, court affidavits from March this year and January 2019 show.

Hyflux is Singapore's most high-profile debt-restructuring case, which has dragged on since a court-supervised process began in May 2018, frustrating creditors and some 34,000 retail investors.

The once corporate highflyer faces about S$2.8 billion of investor claims, more than S$1 billion of which are from holders of its perpetual capital securities and preference shares.

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Judicial managers Borrelli Walsh said earlier this month that they were in talks with 14 new potential investors, without disclosing their identities. That's on top of five existing suitors.

Half of the 14 new bidders for Hyflux are financial investors, including one in Singapore that manages more than US$100 billion in assets, according to the person.

Bids include three more suitors from Singapore: another financial investor with assets over US$20 billion and two non-financial companies with latest annual revenues of more than US$800 million and US$200 million each.

A company from Japan with annual revenue of over US$40 billion and another non-financial firm with operations in Singapore and Japan and yearly revenue of more than $30 billion are also in the race, the person said.

Borrelli Walsh director Patrick Bance declined to comment.

BLOOMBERG