The High Court on Wednesday stayed further proceedings of collecting applications from small investors for the initial public offering of Khulna Printing & Packaging.
The bench of Justice Mirza Hossain Haider and Justice Muhammad Khurshid Alam Sarkar also asked Bangladesh Security and Exchange Commission and the KPPL to explain why they would not be directed to stop all proceedings of collecting IPO applications of KPPL from small investors.
The bench passed the order after hearing a writ petition filed by Supreme Court lawyer Md Raihanul Mostafa challenging the legality of offering the IPO for KPPL that had provided false information in its IPO prospectus to raise capital.
KPPL got the market regulator’s clearance to raise Tk 400 million by issuing 40 million shares on Mar 4 this year. Subscriptions for the IPO opened on May 4 and ended on May 5.
Its IPO prospectus says the firm’s revenue in 2009-10 fiscal was Tk 340 million. But the very next year it surged to Tk 1.19 billion, up by a staggering 247 per cent.
Then, between July 2011 and June 2012, the company’s sales shot up to Tk 2.08 billion before dipping somewhat in July 2012-June 2013 to Tk 1.91 billion.
Industry insiders, however, found KPPL’s claim as outrageous.
-With New Age input
