National Hydro share transaction resumes, traded at Rs 55 per unit

KATHMANDU, APR 18:

Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse)’s decision to withdraw the trading suspension of National Hydropower Company’s shares after eight months today has stirred further disagreement in the company’s board.

Today, National Hydropower’s 25,000 units of shares were traded at the stock exchange in a single transaction at Rs 55 per unit. The fourth hydropower company listed at the stock exchange was suspended for trading by Nepse on July 26, 2012, on the recommendation of the Securities Board of Nepal for its failure to hold its annual general meetings (AGM) and constant fighting among its directors.

Nepse allowed trading as the company completed its remaining AGMs back in January and paid the annual listing fee. However, the chairman and directors of the company are against Nepse’s decision to revoke the trading suspension.

“We discovered some discrepancies in the annual reports so we had requested Nepse to allow trading only after a final audit report is prepared,” said a board director of National Hydropower Dipak Karki.

The dissatisfied board members have requested the share registrar — Growmore Merchant Banker — not to transfer the traded shares.

According to Karki, there is no account of who purchased the unsubscribed 2.5 million unit shares at the time of the company’s public offering. “It is surprising that the company’s board meetings did not record the decisions regarding the placing of unsubscribed shares,” he said.

Moreover, more than 43,000 of the company’s shares are yet to be transferred.

“NB Group wants share trading resumed so that they can release shares in their possession as they are being pressed by their lending banks to repay their personal debts,” said Karki.

Promoters of National Hydropower — NB Group’s directors Laxmi Bahadur Shrestha and Jit Bahadur Shrestha — are blacklisted for defaulting on loans of different banks.

National Hydropower Company has 13,863,462 unit shares listed at Nepse with about 10 million units owned by about 6000 minority shareholders.

Source: THT