The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) indefinitely suspended the trade of More Return (MORE)’s shares following an “abnormality” in the transaction of its shares last week.
The abnormality came after an unusual order to buy the company’s shares from 2 brokers on the selling side to 10 brokers on the buying side on November 10 was set at a price of 2.9 Baht per share which was higher than the closing price of 2.78 Baht on November 9.
The order to buy came from a 4th major shareholder of the company who eventually bought up 1531.77 shares at a total price of 4.44 billion Baht before the share price hit the floor at 1.95 Bath on the same day, representing a drop of 29.96%.
Various Thai news reported that the buyer was Apimuk Bamrungwong.
The share price continued by another 29.74% on November 11 which led the Stock Exchange of Thailand to warn investors about the irregular movement of the stock and the stock closed at 1.37 Baht on that day.
After the stock hit its floor for 2 days in a row, there was speculation over the weekend that the single buyer will not be able to pay for the purchases.
This put the buy-side brokers in peril because they have already paid the 4.4 Billion Baht to the central counterparty.
By Monday, the SET decided to indefinitely suspend the trading of the share on the same day as the T+2 deadline for the buyer to pay the brokers.
“The potential impact could vary depending on the size and volume of the transaction through that broker and currently, all brokers could provide their services to investors as usual,” the SET said in a statement.
“In addition, it is confirmed that clearing and settlement of trading transactions among all brokers and Thailand Clearing House, as the central counterparty, will continue to operate normally,” they said.
“As it appeared to have lots of news about MORE stock during the past weekend, which might be inaccurate and caused investors confused during the past few days, SET deems it appropriate to suspend trading of MORE stock on November 14, 2022, so as to provide investors the opportunities to get more and correct information about MORE stock,” they added.
Pichet Sithi-Amnuai, Chairman of the Association of Thai Securities Companies, told reporters at a press conference that the transaction of MORE’s shares will not have an impact on the stock market since the company’s market capitalization was around 10 billion Baht compared to SET’s market cap of 19.94 trillion Baht.
MORE’s has 3 major businesses including energy-saving equipment, water system operation and real estate. The company’s market capitalization was 8.94 billion Baht, according to SET’s website.
One of the brokers, Daol Securities (Thailand), told reporters that the instruction to buy a stock through many brokers at a high value was an abnormal behavior and never happen before in the SET’s history and they are investigating it.
The securities firm confirmed that they have paid for the shares already and the amount will not impact the company’s financial stability.
Pi Securities, Krungsri Securities, and Capital Nomura Securities have all said that their financial stability will not be impacted by the potentially defaulted deal.
Dr Amrit Klumjitcharoen, Chief Executive Officer of More Return, told reporters on Monday that he is still holding on to 23.69% of the company’s shares and he did not sell any of it.
The Nation reported that the seller of the shares worth 4.4 Billion baht was Amrit.
He urged the regulators to investigate the “mysterious order” that floored the company’s shares last week.
He also said that he is willing to be investigated by related agencies for transparency.