(Bloomberg) — Hanergy Holding Group Ltd., the parent of
the Chinese solar company whose shares plunged 47 percent on
Wednesday, sought to calm its investors, saying it has no
overdue debt and that its operations are working normally.
The five-paragraph statement on Hanergy Holding’s Chinese
language website didn’t mention the drop in the shares of its
Hong Kong-listed affiliate, Hanergy Thin Film Power Group Ltd.
It also made no mention of a report by Reuters that regulators
have for several weeks been examining claims the shares were
manipulated or of why chairman Li Hejun didn’t show up for an
annual shareholder meeting.
Shares of Hanergy Thin Film were suspended from trading
after the rout wiped $19 billion of market value off its market
value in less than half an hour.
It’s a “pretty empty statement,” said Charles Yonts, the
CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets analyst in Hong Kong who raised
questions about Hanergy Thin Film’s valuation in December.
Hanergy, he said, needs “to get clearance from the exchange”
to resume trading, and “I can’t imagine that would pass
muster.”
Li attended a clean-energy exhibition in Beijing on
Wednesday while the shares dropped and hasn’t spoken publicly
about the events.
Hanergy released several statements to regulators on
Wednesday. The first asked for trading in the shares to be
suspended. The second added that the shares were halted
“pending release of an announcement containing insider
information.” The shares remain halted, and no other statements
have been issued through the Hong Kong stock exchange.
In addition to commenting on Hanergy’s operations,
Thursday’s statement from the group said Hanergy didn’t use
Hanergy stocks for derivatives trading, adding that it’s
confident in the development of the listed company.
According to Thursday’s statement, Hanergy Group and its
associates hold about 30.6 billion shares in Hanergy Thin Film.
To contact the reporter on this story:
Iain Wilson in Tokyo at
iwilson2@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Reed Landberg at
landberg@bloomberg.net
Iain Wilson, Amanda Jordan