Formosa Prosonic rises 18% as MD Shih Chao Yuan emerges top shareholder

KUALA LUMPUR: Shares in Formosa Prosonic Industries Bhd (FPI) saw an unusual pick-up in trading activity on Thursday, placing the counter among the top gainers.

The speaker system producer gained 26 sen, or 17.93%, to RM1.71 with 3.9 million shares changing hands at 9.41 am, its highest since late May. Year-to-date, however, the counter has fallen about 39%.

Group managing director Shih Chao Yuan has emerged as the largest shareholder of FPI after acquiring a 24.5% stake from Taiwan-based electronics manufacturer Wistron Corp last week.

A filing with Bursa Malaysia showed that Shih, together with his wife Wu Swee Ngor and his private vehicle Formosa Prosonic Holdings Sdn Bhd, acquired a total of 62.86 million shares via a direct business transaction on Sept 12.

In the second quarter ended June 30, FPI reported a net loss of RM819,000, or 0.32 sen per share, on revenue of RM109.8mil.

For the first half of the year, it recorded a net profit of RM9.8mil, down from RM51.7mil previously, while revenue slid 38% to RM207.3mil from RM334.2mil.