The Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) has suspended Trust Holdings Limited shares from trading on the local bourse after the company failed to meet listing requirements as fears grow that the financial services group could be lurching into a crisis.
Report by Tarisai Mandizha
ZSE operations executive Martin Matanda yesterday confirmed that Trust Holdings, the parent company of under-capitalised Trust Bank, had applied for voluntary suspension. This, according to Matanda, came after the bank failed to release its financial results for the year ending December.
Trust, which currently has a market capitalisation of $2,8 million, began trading on the ZSE in 2001, six years after being founded. The bank, whose minimum capital requirements fall short of the prescribed threshold, has in recent months struggled to meet cash demand from customers.
Group chief executive officer William Nyemba confirmed this development, but could not divulge whether or not the bank would bounce back on the exchange.
“We have asked for it. This is actually a voluntary suspension,” said Nyemba.
ZSE acting chief executive officer Martin Matanda said Trust Holdings has not yet produced its financial results which were due on March 31.
“Trust Bank applied for voluntary suspension because of the unresolved issue of its non-publication of results and the suspension will depend on the resolution of this issue,” said Matanda.
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Trust Bank was closed together with Royal and Barbican and placed under curatorship at the height of the banking sector crisis of 2004, but was reissued a licence in 2010.
ZSE listing rules state that companies which miss the due date for publishing audited results should instead publish unaudited results.
“If a listed company has not distributed annual financial statements to all shareholders within three months of its financial year end, it must publish in the Press and distribute to all shareholders a preliminary report even if the information is unaudited at that time,” reads part of the ZSE listing requirements.
The listing rules also spell out: “On the day following the due date of issue of the listed company’s interim/preliminary report, a letter reminder will be sent by post or facsimile to the listed company requesting that it rectifies the situation and advising that it has been granted a period of one month from the date of such reminder in which to issue its interim/preliminary report, failing which the company’s listing will be suspended and a special meeting of the committee will be convened to consider the continued suspension or termination of the company’s listing.”
