Buyback activity surges to HK$866m in last week of June
Buyers outnumbered sellers in every trading category last week with 47 companies that recorded 206 director purchases worth HK$217 million versus 15 firms with 71 disposals worth HK$107 million based on filings on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in the last week of June.
Meanwhile, the buyback activity surged with 28 companies that posted a whopping 173 repurchases worth HK$866 million based on filings from June 23 to 29. The figures were sharply up from the previous 5-day totals of 21 firms, 111 trades and HK$509 million.
There are four significant points on Yang’s recent purchases:
● The purchases from June 21 to 28 accounted for 68 per cent of the stock’s trading volume
● The chairman resumed buying in June after the stock fell by 23 per cent from HK$1.54 in the second half of May
● The purchases since April are Yang’s first on-market trades since his appointment to his post in March
● Aside from the buys by the chairman this quarter, CFO Zheng Xue Zhi acquired 193,000 shares from May 2 to 5 at an average of HK$1.28 each
Chairman Raymond Lee Man Chun purchased 2 million shares on June 22 at HK$7.05 each, which increased his holdings to 282.000 million shares or 6.24 per cent of the issued capital. He previously acquired HK$210,000 worth of shares in April 2007.
CEO Lee Man Bun, on the other hand, purchased 930,000 shares on June 26 at HK$6.51 each, which boosted his stake to 308.080 million shares or 6.82 per cent. He previously acquired 200,000 shares in December 2014 at HK$4.16 each and HK$2.76 million shares from September to October 2013 at an average of HK$4.65 each. The stock closed at HK$7.25 on Friday.
There are four significant points on these recent purchases:
● Rare acquisitions by these two directors with chairman Lee recording his first purchase since 2007 while CEO Lee recorded his first buy since December 2014
● CEO Lee resumed buying at sharply higher than his acquisition prices from September 2013 to December 2014
● The purchases by these two high-level directors this month were made after the stock rebounded by 19 per cent from HK$5.90 in March
● There were also buybacks by the company this year with 7.96 million shares purchased from May 4 to 8 at HK$6.06 each and 14 million shares from March 16 to April 6 at HK$6.15 each
● The group announced in February a 22.8 per cent gain in annual profit to HK$2.862 billion.
Robert Halili is managing director of Asia Insider