SINGAPORE – Keppel Corp and rig builder Sembcorp Marine (Sembmarine) on Thursday morning (June 24) requested in separate filings to the Singapore Exchange for a halt in the trading of their shares pending announcements.
Keppel announced in January it was exiting the rig business as its offshore and marine unit pivots to clean energy, following a strategic review. Keppel Offshore & Marine would stop building offshore oil-drilling platforms, after the oil price crash saw it post record losses of $1.19 billion in 2020.
Keppel O&M would be separated into three discrete parts, with two of the entities – Rig Co and Dev Co – holding the completed and uncompleted rigs respectively.
Keppel said then it was also exploring inorganic options for the O&M business.
Sembmarine, meanwhile, was recently fully de-merged from its parent Sembcorp Industries. Temasek Holdings, which is the biggest shareholder in Keppel and Sembmarine, dropped its plan last year to take a controlling stake in Keppel, following the company’s poor financial results. Temasek’s role in making a partial offer for Keppel and moving to directly own a stake in Sembmarine had been viewed by many analysts as critical for a consolidation of the struggling O&M sector.
Keppel shares closed on Wednesday up six cents or 1.2 per cent at $5.11, while Sembmarine shares ended 0.2 cent or 1.1 per cent higher at 19.1 cents.
