Stocks to watch: NOL, Jumbo, Tiger Airways, Ezra

MATERIAL announcements were made about or by the following companies before trading commenced on Monday.

Neptune Orient Lines (NOL) said over the weekend it was in talks with France's CMA CGM SA and Denmark's AP Moeller-Maersk over a potential sale of NOL.

In a statement filed with the Singapore Exchange on Saturday, NOL said the talks were "preliminary" and were in relation to "a potential acquisition" of the firm. Marseille-based container transportation and shipping company CMA CGM has made a preliminary offer for NOL, which has a market value of S$2.7 billion, Bloomberg News reported, quoting people with knowledge of the talks.

Jumbo Group made its trading debut on Monday on the Catalist board of the Singapore Exchange. It rose to a high of 39.5 Singapore cents in early trading before easing to 36.5 cents.

Jumbo's S$22.1 million IPO was about eight times subscribed overall.

The company offered about 88.23 million shares at 25 cents each to the public. Retail investors put up S$155.2 million worth of application monies for the two million IPO shares on offer to them. Of the 86.23 million shares available in the placement tranche, 86.17 million worth S$21.5 million were validly subscribed for.

Separately, Jumbo raised some S$18 million from two cornerstone investors - Orchid 1 Investments (which is backed by Temasek) and OSIM's founder Ron Sim.

Singapore Airlines (SIA) on Friday launched a takeover offer for the shares in Tiger Airways that it doesn't already own. The airline said it is seeking to delist and privatise the budget carrier. SIA is offering Tiger shareholders S$0.41 per Tiger share in cash, as well as an option to subscribe for SIA shares at S$11.1043 apiece. SIA currently has a near 56 per cent stake in Tiger.

Ezra Holdings has launched a consent solicitation in relation to two series notes due 2016 and 2018.

The company is convening meetings with noteholders of each series, seeking approval on certain resolutions.

Noteholders who deliver valid votes ahead of the early consent fee deadline of Nov 20 will receive a one-time fee of S$875 per S$250,000 held of the Series 003 Notes and S$500 per S$250,000 for the Series 004 Notes.

Meanwhile, noteholders who vote in favour of the resolutions at the meeting on Dec 2 or after the early deadline will receive S$500 per S$250,000 held of the Series 003 Notes and S$250 per S$250,000 for the Series 004 Notes.

The two notes are part of a S$500 million multi-currency debt issuance programme.