Thursday 6th September 2012
Dear Reader,
NEW ARTICLE
HK land for
HK xenophobes
We explain why the proposed "HK land for HK
people" scheme, while superficially appealing to voters, won't work, and we again propose measures to make the housing and
tax system simpler and fairer, including elimination of stamp duty and mortgage
interest deductions, and land lease reform to open the market and lower the
premiums on new leases. (6-Sep-2012)
RECENTLY ON WEBB-SITE
Webb-site Total Returns launched
Our new system allows
investors, journalists and academics to know what the total return on investment
in any HK-listed stock has been in the last 18 years, and to produce comparisons
and rankings over any period. Say goodbye to bare price charts, where the
dividends and other distributions belong to the fairies. We demonstrate with a
review of 15-year returns in the HKSAR. (6-Aug-2012)
IN OTHER NEWS
Concentration warning in Grand Concord (0844)
SFC, 4-Sep-2012
This follows a request by Webb-site to the SFC late
on Fri-10-Aug-2012 for an investigation of ownership concentration. The snapshot
date is the next trading day, 13-Aug-2012.
The "ATV
Focus" editorial that everyone is talking about...
YouTube, 3-Sep-2012
Neo-Neon (1868) board approves exercise of repurchase mandate, subject to board
approval
Company announcement, 29-Aug-2012
The announcement looks like a desperate attempt to get some
attention, as do the two following announcements about technology. This
announcement says purchases will be made "at such time and price as determined
by the Board" - in other words, they haven't decided when or how much to buy.
The stock rose 83.5% in 1 day on this, on turnover equal to 11.6% of the
company.
SFC commences
legal proceedings against Ernst & Young over access to accounting records
SFC, 27-Aug-2012
Closely following the
SFC's suspension of China High Precision (0591) comes news of another case, this
time involving an auditor which claims that China's law on "state secrets"
prevents it from handing over its paperwork on an aborted IPO. This is a real
test of one country two systems - will the HK courts enforce a mainland law on
secrecy?
SFC directs SEHK to suspend China High Precision (0591)
Company announcement, 22-Aug-2012
This is a
very rare event, and comes after HKEx's Mark Dickens on 6-Aug publicly defended
the decision to allow the stock to resume trading on 3-Aug, which itself broke
with precedent of never commenting on individual cases. Given the high public
interest in this case, where the company refused to share what it called "state
secrets" with its auditor, the SFC should now explain why it has intervened.
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