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Peggy Sito

EMPEROR International Holdings' minority shareholders took their complaints yesterday to the regulatory authorities after they failed to stop the company's plan to tap their pockets for more money.

  Despite a noisy protest from angry minorities, a sizeable $691 million cash call was passed at yesterday's extraordinary general meeting with support from major Emperor owners Albert Yeung Sau-sing, Sonny Yeung Hoi-sing and their associates.

  'About 96 per cent of voting shares at the meeting supported the rights issue proposal. This represents 80.2 million shares or 44.1 per cent interest of the company's issued share capital,' joint managing director Vanessa Fan Man-seung said after the meeting.

  Of this, 62.9 million shares were from the Yeung family.

  Only a small portion of shareholders, with 3.4 million shares or 1.9 per cent of the company, voted against the proposal, said Ms Fan.

  However, six minority shareholders, who lashed out at the company for frequently tapping money from their pocket, walked out from the meeting to show their anger at, and strong protest against, the proposal.

  They also took their anger to the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) and requested it investigate whether the company manipulated the trading of its shares.

  According to some minority shareholders, SFC executive director Laura Cha said the authorities would not consider the verbal complaints because all complaints had to be in black and white.

        Keniel Wong, a director of the stock exchange, said the authorities had considered Emperor's cash call proposal before the plan was announced.

  The procedures for the proposal followed listing rules, he said.

  The cash-offer price represented a 43 per cent discount to the closing price of 67 cents on September 7, a day earlier than the cash call announcement.

  It represented a discount of nearly 80 per cent on the firm's net asset value.



Emperor minorities appeal to SFC