KUALA LUMPUR (May 31): Petaling Tin Bhd's largest shareholder Tan Sri Dr Chen Lip Keong has launched a takeover of the loss-making property development company for RM13.83 million or 40 sen per share.

Chen, 70, now controls 90.002% or 311.25 million of Petaling Tin shares after acquiring 24.28 million shares today and is seeking to undertake an unconditional voluntary takeover offer to acquire the remaining 34.58 million shares or a 9.998% stake.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia today, Petaling Tin said it has received a notice of the take-over offer from Chen to acquire all the remaining shares in the company for 40 sen apiece, which represents a 17.6% premium to the five-day volume weighted average market price of 34 sen as at May 21. Its market capitalisation stood at RM114.12 million.

The closing date will not be later than the 60th day from the posting date.

Chen is also the major shareholder of Karambunai Corp Bhd and FACB Industries Incorporated Bhd. Chen is also the father to Petaling Tin’s chief executive officer (CEO) and non-independent executive director Chen Yiy Fon.

The gaming tycoon is better known as founder of Hong Kong-listed NagaCorp Ltd, which holds a gaming licence in Cambodia until 2035.

This is not the first time Chen is making an offer to take Petaling Tin private. In April 2016, he had offered to buy out the remaining shares of the company at 24 sen per share or RM83 million when he held a controlling 65% stake.

However, independent advisor Inter-Pacific Securities Sdn Bhd (InterPac Securities) had at the time advised minority shareholders to reject Chen's takeover offer as it had deemed the offer “not fair” even though it was “reasonable”.

In evaluating Chen’s takeover offer for Petaling Tin, InterPac Securities noted that the share price offer represented a discount of 85 sen, or 77.98%, to the company’s realisable net asset value of RM1.09 per share then.

On May 28, Petaling Tin reported a narrower net loss of RM3.91 million in its fourth financial quarter ended March 31, 2018 (4QFY18) from RM12.53 million a year ago due to lower impairment loss, reversal of provision for deferred taxation and the absence of one-off costs. Quarterly revenue rose to RM18.05 million from RM790,000 in 4QFY17.

The group’s full FY18 net loss, however, more than doubled to RM16.37 million from RM7.1 million in FY17 due to impairment losses and provisions for tax penalties, as well as a loss on disposal. Revenue declined to RM21.09 million from RM21.52 million in the previous year.