Bursa Malaysia today refused comment over the status of tycoon Tan Sri Vincent Tan's listed Berjaya Corporation's claim in a filing last month with the exchange that Ascot Sports Sdn Bhd had been issued a sports betting licence by the Finance Ministry, which the ministry denied yesterday.
The exchange referred The Malaysian Insider to the company's announcement of its intended acquisition of a controlling stake in Ascot Sports as it was not unconditional.
“Bursa Malaysia highlighted to Malaysian Insider that the conditions of the re-issuance of the licence is stated in the announcement made by Berjaya Corp Berhad on 12 May 2010,” a Bursa official wrote in an e-mail response to questions about whether Berjaya Corporation would be queried.
In the announcement, Berjaya Corporation had stated that “the Minister of Finance has given its approval for the re-issuance to Ascot of the licence to carry out sports betting operations upon certain terms and conditions.
“Ascot proposes to commence its sports betting operation in the 2nd half of the year 2010 with its retail betting operations being housed at 220 selected Sports Toto outlets, subject to relevant approvals being obtained.
“In addition, Ascot also proposes to provide telephone betting services to customers who wish to register accounts with them. The primary focus of Ascot will be on sports betting on soccer games in the initial stages with the aim of increasing their product service offering to other sports in the future subject to the terms and conditions of the licence.”
However, Berjaya Corporation also stated that its proposed acquisition of Ascot Sports was conditional on, among others, “the re-issuance of the licence pursuant to Section 5(1) of the Pool Betting Act, 1967 (revised 1983) or such other laws or legislation that regulate or govern the conduct and operation of the sports betting operations of Ascot by the Minister of Finance to Ascot.”
The proposed acquisition by Berjaya Corporation of Tan’s 70 per cent stake in Ascot included a personal guarantee from the tycoon that the company would make a cumulative net profit of at least RM375 million for the first three years of operation.
Bursa Malaysia officials had pointed out today that because of the conditions of the proposed acquisition, Berjaya Corporation's filing was accurate.
If the company and its directors, including Tan (picture), had misled the exchange, they would have been subject to sections 177 and 369 of the Capital Markets and Services Act 2007.
Section 177 states: “A person shall not make a statement, or disseminate information, that is false or misleading in a material particular and is likely to induce the sale or purchase of securities by other persons or is likely to have the effect of raising, lowering, maintaining or stabilising the market price of securities if, when he makes the statement or disseminates the information — (a) he does not care whether the statement or information is true or false; or (b) he knows or ought reasonably to have known that the statement or information is false or misleading in a material particular.”
Section 369 of the same Act states that a person who knowingly makes a false or misleading statement to the Commission or stock exchange relating to the affairs of a listed corporation shall, on conviction, be liable of a fine not exceeding RM3 million or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 10 years or both.
DAP national publicity secretary Tony Pua said he doubted Tan had jumped the gun by making the announcement, as some have claimed.
“I believe Vincent Tan being an experienced corporate player backed by investment bankers would not have been so careless as to have made the announcement that he received approval for the sports betting licence from the Ministry of Finance if he hasn’t actually received it,” he told The Malaysian Insider.
“The investment bankers would not have prepared the announcement document and prepared to raise funds had such written confirmation not been received.”
The Petaling Jaya Utara MP had earlier demanded in Parliament that Finance Minister and Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak be referred to the Rights and Privileges Committee for allegedly misleading Parliament over the issuance of the Ascot sports betting licence.
It was reported last month that the government had re-issued the licence to Ascot Sports after the original licence was cancelled by the previous administration of Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.
Tan had first obtained the licence in 1987 but had “asked the government to take it back” when the venture was unsuccessful. He retained the right of first refusal if the government decided to re-issue the licence.
Ascot Sports, which is currently a dormant company, recorded net liabilities and net loss of RM11.2 million and RM4.6 million respectively for the financial year ended Dec 31, 2008.
