Quick take: Utusan jumps 74% in early trade

KUALA LUMPUR: Shares in Utusan Melayu (Malaysia) Bhd raced higher in early trade on Monday.

The newspaper publisher surged 73.91%, or 8.5 sen to 20 sen with 49,000 shares done.

Utusan chairman Datuk Abd Aziz Sheikh Fadzir has emerged as the single largest shareholder in the company when he acquired a 31.6% stake on Friday.

A filing with Bursa Malaysia showed he acquired the stake, comprising of 35 million shares, at 19 sen each, for a total of RM6.65mil.

Prior to Friday’s acquisition, he did not own any shares in Utusan.

According to an announcement to Bursa Malaysia on Feb 4, Utusan Malaysia said Abd Aziz had given his notice of intention to deal in securities during closed period pending the announcement by the Company of its financial results for the quarter ended Dec 31, 2018.

Utusan was classified as a Practice Note 17 (PN17) company on Aug 20 due to its financial difficulties.

The company said it is in the midst of formulating a regularisation plan to address its PN17 status.

Source: TheStar