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DHRM - New Presentation submitted as SEC filing
Shows transformational potential of new sleep diagnostic products. Potential increase in Net Income of $18mm/yr by 2017 (over $4/share).
I hear the company may be taping a TV appearance this afternoon. Not sure of the details like when/where it will be shown.
Audit deal may be near Link
U.S. Audit Watchdog Head Optimistic on Ending China Standoff (1)
By Dave Michaels and Alan Katz February 05, 2014
U.S. regulators would be able to inspect audit work done in China under an agreement the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board expects to complete this year, Chairman James R. Doty said.
Any agreement would come amid increased interest by Chinese companies in listing on U.S. stock exchanges, Doty added. Eight Chinese companies had initial public offerings in the U.S. last year, up from three in 2012. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., China’s largest e-commerce company, said in November that it’s deciding whether to sell shares in the U.S. or Hong Kong.
“This confirms the importance to us of staying or remaining in pursuit of some means of accessing those work papers of audits before they become enforcement files,” Doty said today at a Securities and Exchange Commission meeting to review the PCAOB’s 2014 budget.
The prospective accord would end a three-year standoff over the board’s inability to access work papers for audits of China-based firms listed in the U.S. Chinese affiliates of the four largest accounting firms were barred last month from leading audits of companies traded in the U.S. after failing to provide documents at the heart of a series of accounting fraud probes.
The firms said they planned to appeal the decision to the five commissioners. That appeal must be filed by Feb. 12.
Positive Development
Doty’s statement today won’t have any impact on that process, said Jason Flemmons, a former SEC accountant who is now a senior managing director at FTI Consulting Inc. Progress on resolving the dispute is a positive development, he said.
“It is a big and significant statement; it’s just hard to tell how it will be carried out,” Flemmons said. It sounds to me that there is more genuine desire on both sides to take the next step.’’
China-based auditors have argued they are caught between U.S. law, which requires them to turn over all documents requested by regulators, and Chinese law, which prohibits transferring data that might contain state secrets to foreign parties.
An agreement in May between the two countries allowed some cooperation, and U.S. regulators have received documents on at least four companies, China’s regulator said last month. That agreement didn’t allow for PCAOB inspections in China.
Access Compromise
A compromise could be struck by giving the PCAOB access to work papers or allowing it to meet with auditors outside China, Doty said.
“We can do a lot of things to try to deal with logistics, but we cannot compromise on whether we have the information and the access we need for an inspection,” he said. “It may be that we do not need to be on the ground.”
The PCAOB has exchanged drafts of agreements with Chinese officials that spell out how the U.S. watchdog would access audit documents and hopes to “make some progress” before the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue scheduled for July.
Sending the dozens of boxes of papers out of China needed to review each audit may not be practical, FTI’s Flemmons said. “Given the volume of materials, I would expect that the bulk of the work would have to be done in-country,” he said.
NINE $1.80 buyout Link
CXDC: Morgan Stanley extends to 2019 Link
This is great news because it eliminates the possibility of a cash squeeze that could have occurred if the preferred had to be redeemed in 2014 or 2015 at the same time the company needs funds for its Sichuan plant.
The complete text of the amendment sounds like conversion to stock is the expected outcome.
Re: SEC
The actual text of the ruling was pretty narrowly stated. The judge essentially said that it was not his responsibility to assess fairness or solve an international disagreement. All he could do was judge whether or not the auditors complied with US law. They did not comply. Then he judged that the rationale for non-compliance was known in advance. The auditors knew that China would prevent them from turning over work papers to US regulators, but they established their practices and did the audits anyway. So the judge ruled that the auditors willfully disregarded US law. But he left open the possibility/hope for a diplomatic solution that would negate his ruling.
US companies want access to the Chinese domestic market. Chinese companies want access to the US capital market. Everybody would win from a diplomatic solution and everybody would lose from failure to find agreement.
Re: GAME The offer is $6.90
Re: VISN
No shares to borrow at IB. Indicated rate of 97%.
No shares to borrow at Fidelity. Indicated rate of 42%.
UTSI late news link
UTStarcom Announces Share Purchase from SoftBank
BEIJING, Jan. 17, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- UTStarcom Holdings Corp. ("UTStarcom" or "the Company") (UTSI), a leading provider of media operational support services and broadband products and services, today announced that it entered into a Purchase and Sale Agreement (the "Share Purchase Agreement") with SoftBank America Inc. ("SoftBank") and Shah Capital Opportunity Fund LP ("Shah Capital") on January 17, 2014. The transaction was consummated on the same date.
Pursuant to the Share Purchase Agreement, SoftBank sold its entire stake in the Company, consisting of 4,883,875 ordinary shares with par value US$0.00375 per share ("Ordinary Shares"). The Company and Shah Capital purchased 3,883,875 and 1,000,000 Ordinary Shares, respectively, for a price of $2.54 per Ordinary Share. Following the consummation of the transaction, Shah Capital's beneficial ownership in the Company increased from 17.2% to 21.9%.
SoftBank, a major shareholder since October 1995, recently notified the Company that it had made an overall change in its investment strategy. The parties therefore worked together to execute a sale of SoftBank's stake that would mitigate volatility in UTStarcom's share price.
MR hit piece link
CCM: Trading ex-dividend by 72 cents today.
Re: IKGH
Yes, the link is Suncity. It is valued at 7X EBITDA. My point is that at 7X EBITDA IKGH (in the same business) would be valued around $5.25.
IKGH - comp going public via reverse merger in Hong Kong at a valuation of 7X EBITDA link. Implies valuation of $5.25 for IKGH.
Re: VLOV
The risk in owning stocks like this is that you usually have no idea what has happened since the company went dark. No reporting and no shareholder meetings. Maybe the Directors approved the sale of all of the company's operating business for $1. Or increased the CEO's comp from $100000 to $10mm. Or issued 100mm new shares.
There was a real VLOV business in China. But what, if anything, is the current connection between the Nevada corporation (VLOV Inc) and that operating business?
YONG meeting date set
DEFM14A - Definitive proxy statement relating to merger or acquisition
Looks like this will make it over the finish line.
Re: DHRM
Sleep is the new sex. Everybody wants more.
Re: CNTF
That came from personal conversation with the company. I'm not in a position to judge the accuracy.
Accumulating these patents has clearly been a multi-year strategy for the company. I don't know the extent to which it will pay off. The CEO believes that the company's patents, real estate, and phone business are each equally valuable.
Re: CNTF
Investor Presentation
Patent details are on page 13
Re: Video Games
CNTF claims to have 22 Chinese patents related to motion sensitive gaming and applications outstanding for 148 more Chinese patents.
Basically, while the ban on foreign consoles was in effect, CNTF tried to claim Chinese patents on all of the related technologies.
According to CNTF, the foreign companies will need to negotiate licenses with CNTF in order to sell their consoles in China.
CCCL new website for the operating business
Corporate website is still the same ole www.cceramics.com
re: KEYP Pink Sheets link
Re: AMCF
The wording is strange, but I think the Chairman/CEO (An Fengbin) is giving up the CEO title to the current CFO (Wang Hao). And therefore Wang Hao is giving up the CFO title to the current deputy CFO (Quan Zhang). So everybody gets a pay raise and business as usual resumes Monday morning ...
re: ZA
Stock traded an average of 10200 shares/day from Jan 1 through AUgust 12 2013. Since then it has traded an average of 149500 shares/day.
There are only 27.8mm ADS outstanding and insiders own 57%. So about 12mm ADS available for trading. Churned up pretty good in the past couple weeks.
Re: WH
Looks like they only need $22.5mm which was going to be contributed as equity with no independent debt financing required.
Passing of the deadlines gave the buyers several easy outs, but for whatever reason they are still trying to complete the deal. My guess is that it goes through.
WH Update
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WSP Holdings Limited Announces Update on Going Private Transaction
PR Newswire
WUXI, China, Jan. 2, 2014
WUXI, China, Jan. 2, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- WSP Holdings Limited(WH) (" WSP Holdings(WH)" or the "Company"), a leading Chinese manufacturer of API (" American Petroleum Institute") and non-API seamless casing, tubing and drill pipes used in oil and natural gas exploration, drilling and extraction ("Oil Country Tubular Goods" or "OCTG"), and other pipes and connectors, today announced that the parties to the going private transaction of the Company previously announced on February 21, 2013 are in discussions with the special committee of the Company's board of directors regarding, among other things, extending the outside date of December 31, 2013 under the Agreement and Plan of Merger in order to give the parties more time to complete the transaction. The Company cautions its shareholders and others considering trading in its securities that there can be no assurance that an agreement will be reached.
LTON now trading as LTONY
And a business update
Singapore, January 2, 2014 — Linktone Ltd. (OTCQB: LTONY, ASX: LTL) (“Linktone” or the “Company”), a provider of media and entertainment content and services in key strategic markets in Asia, announced today it is repositioning its strategic focus and refining its business vision. This multi-faceted initiative involves concentrating on high growth businesses in China and elsewhere, and transitioning away from telecommunication value-added services in China.
With regard to this initiative, Hary Tanosoedibjo, Chairman and CEO of Linktone, commented, “Our announcement today reflects the next phase of our business’ evolution resulting from our detailed analysis of our core competencies and review of our extensive product portfolio. Given the increasingly challenging regulatory climate in the value-added services market in China coupled with the rapid penetration of smart phones which support a wide variety of other payment modes, we envisage the use of short codes as a payment gateway to be significantly adversely affected. Moreover, we anticipate that the traditional role of service providers as a gateway to content providers will continue to diminish because increasing numbers of content providers are securing short codes directly from the mobile operators, thus bypassing service providers like Linktone.
On the other hand, our digital games business, Letang, and our parenting portal, www.fumubang.com, are demonstrating healthy growth trends. Letang, through Google Play, has extended its reach to many overseas markets, and Letang’s single player games have gained encouraging popularity especially in Russia, Brazil, Mexico and South East Asia. Within China, Letang will continue to license popular intellectual properties and animation characters such as Boonie Bears ??? to develop and distribute mobile online games. Our other digital property, Fumubang, launched in 2012, has been gaining significant momentum among parents in Beijing and Shanghai, and we have plans to replicate the growth in other major cities of China. We intend to make Fumubang the butler in every Chinese parent’s pocket.
Outside of China, we remain focused on growing our social commerce and media content businesses. Our online news and entertainment portal in Indonesia, Okezone.com, currently has over two million daily users, and we believe its popularity will continue to grow in this country of 250 million people. In addition, our subsidiary Innoform has established an e-retail business, Happybuys.com, which focuses on bringing popular entertainment related products to consumers worldwide at local prices and has been experiencing an increase in unique visitors and sales.
Our media content business operated by Innoform will also continue to create, license and distribute entertainment content across Southeast Asia and across multiplatforms, including our successful staging of a series of “On the Ground” (OTG) family-focused events in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Indonesia.
As such, the Board and I strongly believe that this strategic realignment of Linktone’s business portfolio is essential for enhancing the future value of Linktone. We believe that by focusing our efforts and resources on our growing digital properties, we will solidly position our business to deliver higher returns to our shareholders.”
Linktone has begun the process of transitioning out of the China value-added services business. We foresee the transition to occur over a period of time for the company to fulfill and complete existing commercial obligations and arrangements. The Company expects the revenue contribution from value-added services to decline significantly while the revenue contribution from the remaining businesses to grow in 2014.
At this stage, it is too early to fully determine the financial ramifications of the Company's new strategic direction, but the Company will monitor and evaluate such ramifications as its plan is implemented, including the impact on its recorded balances of assets and liabilities resulting from restructuring expenses for employee-related and other costs.
Re: ZA
I like it a lot. Recent news seemed positive. Sales fair results much better than I feared (orders down 15%, but that's from 25% fewer stores). Dividend will be announced in April (I'm expecting a modest recurring amount rather than a special, but it's a great governance signal). New accessories outlets (I love the countercyclical investment - much better than just sitting on the cash forever).
It seems that one large holder was determined to dump its position by year-end. This is the downside of low float. They knew they were getting a terrible price on their sales, but I think they were in since the IPO and being down 80%, the next $1 probably didn't seem so important.
Re: NOAH
Supposedly a Chinese media article said new regs would ban 3rd party WMP sales. Those were once a core business for NOAH, but are now <10% of revenues.
This SA article spotted the risk several weeks ago.
Re; WPCS
So that explains it ...
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Shares in a little-known tech firm are up more than 65% in pre-market trading this morning after it announced it was preparing to launch a beta version of its Bitcoin trading platform.
Pennsylvania-based WPCS says it recently acquired BTXTrader, which is developing what it says is the first trading platform allowing Bitcoin users to "access market data and execute orders on the five most popular Bitcoin exchanges in a single application."
"Obviously, we are still in development mode, but we're on schedule to release both web and mobile versions of our platform by early 2014," BTX Trader Chief Operating Officer Ilya Subkhankulov said in the release.
The firm's shares surged more than 20% to $1.81 on heavy volume in after-hours trading yesterday. We first saw the story on Marketwatch as reported by Wallace Witkowski.
Very little has been written about WPCS, which bills itself as a communications infrastructure firm. They IPO'd in 2003 at more than $140 and spent the next 10 years going to practically zero.
Re: VISN
85% borrow rate, no shares available to short at IB
Re: ZX
Yes, I sent a letter to each of the independent directors.
NED Buyout Offer Link
Morgan Stanley PEA backing
Re: LTON
Only significant institutional s/h at 9/30 was quant fund Renaissance Tech. Their model may not allow unlisted stocks.
For whatever reasons LTON is not going completely dark. It has been making all regulatory and financial filings required for its ASX listing.
Re: CXDC
That guy's ridiculously complicated model is worthless because it doesn't match the company's straightforward expansion plan
ZX: QVT disclosed increased position Link
Re: ZA
This was the second quarter in a row where very meaningful information came out in the cc. Last quarter they disclosed they planned to close a huge number of stores. This quarter they disclosed pretty good 2014 orders and intention to pay a dividend.
Re: SVM
As the full case docs are posted, it will be interesting to learn how short-sellers conduct research and then trade the impact of their reports.
Here is the full text of the BCSC Notice
Re: SVM
A*L Responds to BCSC Allegations
A*L Responds to BCSC Allegations
December 20, 2013
Yesterday, the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) announced it would hold a hearing to determine whether I fraudulently made certain statements in my September 2011 reports questioning the resources and grades of the SGX mine owned by Silvercorp Metals (SVM).
The BCSC’s allegations are false and without merit. I am taking legal action to both defend my reports and to hold accountable those public servants at the BCSC who have ignored my warnings about SVM.
I am preparing a point-by-point rebuttal of the BCSC’s allegations that I will file in due course.
I have used Alfredlittle.com for 3 years to publish my investment insights, both long and short. Directly as a result of my efforts, all 7 of the companies I accused of fraud were delisted by the U.S. exchanges. The SEC charged 3 of the companies with fraud. I have saved thousands of investors hundreds of millions, perhaps even billions of dollars from the hands of fraudulent Chinese companies.