Temasek Holdings, AEM Holdings’ largest shareholder, has been steadily adding its stake in the chip tester. The most recent transaction was on April 12, when Temasek, via a subsidiary called Venezio, paid $1.93 million for 403,100 shares. This works out to an average of $4.79 each.
With this transaction, Temasek’s stake in AEM has increased to nearly 37.4 million shares, equivalent to 12.08%, up from 11.95%. Prior to this, on April 7, Venezio paid $1.63 million for 344,100 shares, or $4.74 each. Earlier, on March 16, Venezio paid $1.99 million for 467,600 shares.
Temasek became AEM’s largest shareholder last August, after Venezio invested $103.1 million for 26.8 million new shares via a placement, or $3.8477 each. The placement gave Venezio a stake of 8.678% but Temasek has a couple of other fund management subsidiaries that own smaller pieces of AEM, giving Temasek a total deemed stake of 9.02% then.
In contrast, Malaysia’s Employees Provident Fund Board (EPF), known to be an active investor in the regional markets, cut its stake recently. On Feb 4, the board sold 854,200 shares for $3.87 million, which works out to an average of $4.53 each.
With that, the EPF is left with 14.84 million shares, or 4.794%, down from 15.69 million shares, or 5.071%. As the EPF is no longer a substantial shareholder, it is no longer obliged to report further selling.
Separately, on April 18, Citibank analyst Jame Osman initiated coverage on AEM Holdings with a “buy” call and $6.37 target price, saying the company is “well-positioned for the next phase of business growth” as it stands to benefit from its “key customer’s” significant expansion in capex and production capacity.
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The customer, believed to be Intel Corp, has earmarked US$25 billion to US$26billion ($34 billion to $35 billion) over 2022–2024 to build new facilities in Malaysia and Vietnam where AEM’s production line is located.
As such, Osman expects a “positive flow-through impact” to AEM as it ramps up production of its next-gen testers to Intel.
Tritech and Wilmar
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Lee Sui Hee, a substantial shareholder of Tritech Group, has added to his stake. On April 11, Lee paid $256,000 for 8 million shares, or 3.2 cents each. This brings his total holdings to 82.3 million shares, equivalent to 8.11%, up from 7.32%.
The change in Lee’s interests were disclosed in a filing on April 15. On April 12, just a day after Lee bought his shares, and before the disclosure of the change, Tritech was the second most heavily traded stock that day. It surged 11.76% to close the day at 3.8 cents.
The unusual trading drew a query from the Singapore Exchange. In its reply later on April 12, Tritech says it is not aware of why the shares moved the way they did and that it believes it is in compliance of applicable rules.
On March 25, the company announced plans to raise up to $33.8 million from a group of new investors that will take up nearly 742.2 million shares at 3 cents each for the first tranche, and 5 cents each for the subsequent tranche. Lee was not listed in this group of investors.
Tritech, which is in civil engineering, aims to expand its business to include fish farming and to also expand its existing business in membrane technology. It is also planning to go into the water treatment market across Asia.
Elsewhere, Kerry Group, a substantial shareholder of Wilmar International, has sold 2.3 million shares for $10.6 million, which works out to an average of $4.59 per share. Kerry Group holds its stake in the agri-giant via a group of subsidiary entities.
With the sale, Kerry Group’s interest in Wilmar has been trimmed to 692.3 million shares, equivalent to 10.987%, and down from 11.023% previously.
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