Sapphire hit by HNA blues?

REMEMBER that delightfully fuzzy feeling when you walk into your hotel room and discover a thoughtfully-wrapped dark chocolate perched on your pillow? Or little orchids strung to a box of macaroons (or a sonnet) or beribboned lavender sprigs for a pillow surprise?

Indeed, they may be nice to have but not a must-have, somewhat like mainboard-listed Sapphire Corp's major shareholders' shares swop deal with a unit of troubled Chinese conglomerate HNA Group. The deal flopped over a week ago after it was first announced in October last year which had then sent the stock into a tizzy.

The S$46 million transaction would have seen Sapphire's two largest shareholders Best Feast Ltd and Ou Rui Ltd - this firm is wholly owned by one of the richest PRC nationals and veteran investor Li Xiaobo - swop their collective stake of nearly 28 per cent at 51 Singapore cents per share for shares in Hong Kong International Construction Investment Management Group Co (HKICIM) - a Hong Kong-listed firm and property development arm of HNA.