Chinwendu Obienyi
First Aluminium Nigeria Plc has explained its decision to delist from the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), adding that its shareholders were not benefiting from the continued listing and were not getting exit opportunities.
The company also said that its shares have continued to trade at a significant discount to the intrinsic value and as a result, investments of shareholders are locked up, thereby finding it hard to dispose their shareholding.
According to an explanatory notification sent to the NSE, the company revealed that its share price was stuck at 50 kobo for about six years between June 2011 and June 2017, and thereafter experienced further diminution, both in share price and trading volumes.
The statement also added that over the last 18 months, daily average volume ranged between 2,815 to roughly 2,918 units during the period July 2017 to December 2018.
It said: “Pursuant to the resolution of the board of directors of First Aluminium Nigeria Plc duly passed at the meeting of the board of directors of the Company which held on August 8 2018, the board of directors approved and resolved to recommend to the shareholders of the company the delisting of all the ordinary issued share capital of the Company, 2,110,359,242 units from the Daily Official List and from trading on the Main Board of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.” The delisting will afford the company to carry-out an imminent Corporate Restructuring exercise to take advantage of emerging opportunities and may consider re-listing the company in the future if the market conditions are favourable”.