KUALA LUMPUR (June 22): Based on corporate announcements and news flow today, stocks in focus tomorrow (June 23) could include United Malacca Bhd, MISC Bhd, Bintai Kinden Corp Bhd, George Kent (M) Bhd, Aluminium Company of Malaysia Bhd, Eduspec Holdings Bhd and S P Setia Bhd.
United Malacca Bhd's net profit in its fourth quarter ended April 30, 2017 (4QFY17) rose 43% to RM29 million from RM20.23 million a year ago, thanks to higher fresh fruit bunches (FFB) production, and better crude palm oil (CPO) and palm kernel prices.
Earnings per share in the quarter climbed to 13.86 sen from 9.67 sen a year ago. Revenue was up 47% at RM70.28 million compared with RM47.9 million previously.
The company proposed a second interim single-tier dividend of 12 sen, and a special 3 sen single-tier dividend, both payable on Aug 24. This brings its total FY17 payout to 23 sen, up 44% from the 16 sen dividend it paid in FY16.
Its FY17 annual net profit came in 42% higher at RM84.55 million from RM59.57 million in FY16, as CPO and PK prices grew 28% and 67% respectively, coupled with an 8% higher FFB production, it said. Revenue grew 34% year-on-year to RM274.71 million from RM205.74 million.
MISC Bhd has secured a contract to own and operate two specialist DP2 offshore loading shuttle tankers via its wholly-owned subsidiary, AET Tanker Holdings Sdn Bhd.
The vessels will operate in oilfields on the Norwegian Continental Shelf of the North Sea, Norwegian Sea and the southern Barents Sea.
The contract, which is granted by Norwegian-based energy company Statoil ASA, has an estimated value of US$200 million (RM857 million) for a 5-year charter period or US$275 million for a 7-year charter period.
Statoil will decide on and announce the charter period by Dec 31, 2017, said MISC.
Bintai Kinden Corp Bhd has bagged a S$39.6 million (RM122.1 million) contract from Singapore's Land Transport Authority (LTA) to undertake mechanical services work for the four-in-one rail and bus depot in Singapore.
Bintai Kinden said its 69.82%-owned subsidiary Bintai Kindenko Pte Ltd had yesterday accepted a letter of award from the LTA to undertake the mechanical work for the supply and installation of the environmental control system for the depot.
"No major risk is foreseeable on the contract, except for the possibility of long construction period that will overstretch the preliminary costing, but this can be mitigated with close monitoring of status and planning on manpower required," it added.
George Kent (M) Bhd reported a 23% rise in first quarter net profit at RM18.5 million from RM15.01 million a year earlier on higher revenue from its construction and water-meter units.
George Kent said group revenue climbed to RM129.42 million in the first quarter ended April 30, 2017 (1QFY18) from RM122.96 million. George Kent undertakes its construction and water-meter businesses under its engineering and metering divisions respectively.
The company said it secured a major contract for the supply of water meters in 1QFY18. Including its engineering division contracts, George Kent said its total order book had grown to RM6.1 billion.
Aluminium Company of Malaysia Bhd (Alcom) is investing RM18 million to expand capacity of its coated fin stock business.
The capacity expansion will be undertaken by addition of a production line in its existing facility in Bukit Raja, Selangor.
The new line is anticipated to be fully commissioned in the next two financial years and the group expects to see return from the new line, which will add 12,000 tonnes to its annual coated fin stock capacity a year after that.
Coated fin stock is mainly used for the fin production of heat exchanger and is commonly used in the production of condenser and evaporator of air conditioners and refrigerators.
Eduspec Holdings Bhd entered a framework agreement to appoint Beijing ZhongChuang HuaYing Technology Co Ltd (BZC) for the promotion and distribution of the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Academy (CMRA) certified Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Robotics curriculum in China.
The agreement also seeks to appoint BZC as the exclusive distributor in China for a period of five years at a total contract value of US$15 million (RM64.36 million), Eduspec said.
The agreement, which was signed yesterday, is expected to enable Eduspec to start distributing its STEM robotics programme in the country, where it was given exclusivity in distribution along with other markets in a 2016 agreement signed with iCarnegie Global Learning LLC/Robomatter Inc.
S P Setia Bhd has signed a conditional share purchase agreement to acquire I&P Group Sdn Bhd from its controlling shareholder Permodalan Nasional Bhd (PNB) for RM3.65 billion cash.
S P Setia is proposing a cash call plus private placement to raise the required funding.
The group’s fundraising proposal involves a renounceable rights issue of new shares, renounceable rights issue of a new Class B Islamic redeemable convertible preference shares (RCPS-i B), and a private placement of new shares, with each exercise expected to raise RM1.2 billion.
The RCPS-i B has a profit rate of 5.93% a year, is non-callable for the first five years, and will be convertible to ordinary shares at a conversion ratio to be determined later. Its entitlement basis and the issue price will be fixed at a later stage, S P Setia said.
It said the purchase price is at a discount of approximately 39.3% to the adjusted unaudited net asset value of I&P Group.
http://www.theedgemarkets.com/article/united-malacca-misc-bintai-kinden-george-kent-alcom-eduspec-and-s-p-setia
