KUALA LUMPUR: SapuraKencana Petroleum Bhd has been and is taking steps to ensure it is a syariah-compliant stock, as required by the Securities Commission by end financial year Jan 31, 2015, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday.
As a result of the steps to be taken, it expects to be included back on the SC’s update list of syariah compliant companies when that is published after the next review in May 2015.
On Thursday, the company was not included in SC’s Syariah compliant list of companies trading on Bursa Malaysia when the list was posted on its website.
The SC decides on whether a listed stock is Syariah compliant or not, based on calculations based on the last audited accounts on Jan 31, 2014.
SapuraKencana was taken off the list because one of the three compliance requirements was that conventional debt cannot be more than two-thirds of the total assets of a company.
“It has borrowed completely in conventional debt as Malaysian banks do not have large enough US dollar Islamic products/limits to support the company’s debt.
“This has been explained to the SC by leading banks which have lent to the company.
“So, the company has been working with the banks in the last six months or so on this matter.
“The 14 banks, including nine foreign banks, have been very supportive and gotten internal approvals to convert the required portion into syariah compliant debt,” the sources added.
The exercise is expected to be completed by SapuraKencana before the financial year ending Jan 31, 2015, that is, within the next month or so.
Hence, SapuraKencana is expected to be back on the Syariah compliance list in the next SC review in May 2015, they added. — Bernama