☕️ BN, PN announced its GE15 candidates

1. MARKET SUMMARY

2. NUMBERS AT A GLANCE

RM2.8 bil was raised via initial public offerings (IPO) in the first nine months of 2022 — 22% higher than the same period in 2021. 31 companies have been listed so far as of October 2022 and Bursa Malaysia expects to end the year with 37 new listings.

3,677,848 — the number of registered voters in Selangor, up 52.3% from 2,415,074 people after the implementation of Undi18 and automatic voter registration. This makes Selangor with the highest number of registered voters for GE15.

USD36 mil — the settlement amount New York City and the state of New York have to pay two men after they were wrongly convicted in the 1965 murder of Malcolm X. Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam were sentenced to life in prison in 1965. Aziz was released on parole in 1985, whilst Islam was released on parole in 1989, and died in 2009. They were exonerated in November after an investigation showing the FBI and the New York Police Department withheld evidence in the original trial in 1966.

3. IN MALAYSIA 🇲🇾

GE15 Updates:

1. UMNO President Ahmad Zahid Hamidi has denied allegations that the party’s candidates were asked to sign a statutory declaration (SD) pledging support for him and giving him the mandate to form the cabinet if BN wins the election, calling it “all lies”.. UMNO supreme council member Zahidi Zainul Abidin affirmed the existence of this SD, however, he said he‘s unsure what is the purpose of the SD.

2. BN has announced its candidates (list here). Zahid Hamidi and caretaker PM Ismail Sabri will defend their seats in Bagan Datuk and Bera each, respectively. Tengku Zafrul will be making his electoral debut, contesting in Kuala Selangor. Khairy Jamaluddin will contest in Sg Buloh, making him the only incumbent BN MP to be given a new seat (hmm, we wonder why). Long-serving MPs such as Shahidan Kassim, Annuar Musa, Adham Baba and Zahidi Zainul Abidin and Tajuddin Abdul Rahman would not contest — a Twitter user called it a “small win” for Malaysians. 

3. Dropped Shahidan said he will defend his Arau seat despite being dropped and said he has yet to decide which party he will contest for. Rumours are circulating that Annuar Musa might contest under PN, which will be announced tonight. 

4. PN has announced its candidates as well (list here). Party big names, including Muhyiddin Yassin (Pagoh), Azmin Ali (Gomba), Hamzah Zainuddin (Larut) and  Saifuddin Abdullah (Indera Mahkota), will defend their seats. Rina Harun has been moved to Sepang from Titiwangsa. 

5. MIC has skipped the BN candidate launch event and will consider not fielding any candidates. The party’s central working committee has called for an emergency meeting today to decide on the party’s future.  

6. Former MCA president Ong Tee Keat returned from retirement five years ago to contest in Pandan but under a Warisan ticket, going up against Rafizi Ramli. 

Zaid Ibrahim to sue Malaysian Bar and its president

Zaid Ibrahim has filed a defamation suit against the Malaysian Bar and its president Karen Cheah over her statement (read here) on Zaid and his legal team’s conduct during the final appeal of Najib Razak’s SRC International case. He claimed that the information was “falsely and maliciously” published, insinuating that the lawyers had abused the court process, undermined the justice system through unscrupulous strategies and committed professional misconduct.

Business roundup:

1. 7-Eleven sharp share price rise 7-Eleven Malaysia Holdings Bhd saw its share price rise 51% over the last three weeks. In a filing with Bursa Malaysia, it says it is not aware of any reason that contributed to the momentum of its share price. The Edge reported last week that 7E is in talks with US-based private equity giant Carlyle Group to sell its 75%-owned Caring Pharmacy, which made an offer of RM1.3 bil, but 7E is seeking an amount between RM1.5 - 1.8 bil. 7E’s largest shareholder is Berjaya’s Vincent Tan, who controls 41.1% of the company.

2. Serba Dinamik’s woes keep persistingThe embattled oil and gas company, previously embroiled in an accounting scandal, announced that it has defaulted on an instalment of USD5.87 mil, which is part of a USD43 mil invoice financing and Murabaha facility. The company is also applying for an extension of time up to 31 Jan 2023 to issue its two annual reports, which was due yesterday, and attributed the delay to the loss of a “significant number of staff” across the organisation and “critical personnel”, especially its CFO and financial controller. The company’s share price is now worth 2 sen with a market cap of RM74.5 mil. 

3. Pharmaniaga x JD.com in China expansionThe pharmaceutical company has signed a MoU with JDMas, the official partner of JD.com, to commercialise its products in China through the online retailer’s platform. It expects to achieve a revenue of USD30 mil by 2025 through this partnership.

4. AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

Musk’s biographer foresees future litigation… 

Elon Musk’s biographer, Walter Isaacson, believes that the Twitter purchase will spell more time in the courts for the SpaceX founder. Musk suspects that he has been misled about some aspects of his purchase of the bird app. Isaacson foresees lawsuits involving “everything from compensation to people, Musk feels withheld information illegally from him”.

However, Isaacson also said he was not sure how successful any lawsuits would be and that Musk himself could also be looking at legal action from former Twitter executives, including the former CEO and CFO, after what Isaacson describes as a contentious meeting over the purchase of Twitter.

…amid a scraping of Twitter’s board of directors.

Musk also axed the entirety of Twitter’s board of directors, leaving himself the sole remaining director. While he has not said anything, it is likely that a new board of directors will be appointed in the coming weeks.

But hey, Vine reboot!

In one of his first orders of business, Musk has tasked Twitter’s engineers with working on a relaunch of the short-video app, the predecessor to TikTok. This was already teased by Musk when he posted a poll asking if Vine should be brought back.

Still, one engineer revealed Vine’s old code base needs a lot of work, so maybe don’t hold your breath over that end-of-year deadline Musk allegedly gave the engineers, okay?

On the Ukrainian front

• Russia extends evacuation zone in Ukraine’s Kherson regionRussian-installed officials in Ukraine’s Kherson region will start evacuating citizens from the eastern bank of the Dnipro river, citing fears of “prohibited methods of war” by Ukrainian forces on the Kakhovka dam that could flood the region.

• Tinkoff bank founder renounces Russian citizenshipBillionaire banker Oleg Tinkov is no longer a Russian citizen, showing a certificate stating his exit from Russian citizenship and calling for more Russian businessmen to follow him. Such exits would weaken the economy and regime of President Vladimir Putin, according to the tycoon.Tinkov has shown anti-war sentiments since the start of the conflict, which has resulted in him being forced to relinquish his 35% stake in Tinkoff Bank’s parent company, TCS Group Holding, to Russian metals tycoon Vladimir Potanin in April.

• Russia accuses UK of hitting Nord Stream gas pipelinesRussia called out the UK for carrying out attacks on the Nord Stream undersea gas pipelines, with the Kremlin already considering its response to the alleged sabotage. However, no proof was offered that the British military was involved. The UK has dismissed the allegations as false, stating the accusations are to divert attention away from Russia’s military failures in Ukraine.An analysis here explaining why Russia is most unlikely to sabotage the pipelines at its own expense and could be the act of other Western superpowers. 

On the China market

• Traders gain on shorting Chinese stocksTraders pulled in US$4.4 billion in two days by short-selling Chinese stocks trading in the US and Hong Kong last week, with the downward pressure on the stocks driven by the uncertain economic future from China’s leadership shuffle.‘Buy low, sell high’ is what we call long. Profits can also be made by ‘sell, buy low’ by short-selling. Short-selling is when an investor borrows securities and sells them in the hopes of buying them back in future at a lower price, pocketing the difference in value. Basically, the investor bets on the value of the shares or securities to continue declining.

• China markets rally after unconfirmed socmed post on easing Covid Zero policyChinese stocks and the yuan saw a rally amid speculation that policymakers are preparing to loosen the strict Covid Zero policy that has been the biggest detriment for investors and the Chinese economy. The speculation is based on social media posts that a committee was being formed to assess how China will exit the policy. However, the social media posts are unverified, with China’s foreign ministry stating it was unaware of any committees forming for that purpose.Still, the rally led to stabilisation beyond China markets. The broader market rally led to gains in oil, iron ore, copper, aluminium and zinc as Asian equities climbed more than 2%.

Shorts:

1. Taylor Swift nabs all US Top 10 spots, the first artist in history to do so, thanks to her latest album Midnights.

2. Chinese fashion retailer Shein will be opening its first-ever permanent store this month, with the store located on Cat Street in Tokyo’s Harajuku fashion district.

3. The mock grave of Dobby, the house elf from the Harry Potter universe, is safe for now and will remain at Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire for now, amid concerns about pollution from high visitor numbers.

5. FOR YOUR EYES 👁👁

1. Argentinian artist Maximiliano painted a giant mural measuring 40m wide x 45m tall of the late football legend Diego Maradona, who would turn 60 on Sunday.

2. The best Halloween costume goes to …...

3. Photographer Siva Kumar dedicated his 1,000th Instagram post (a video below) to an “iron woman” on top of Petronas Twin Tower carrying out the dangerous job of changing light bulbs. Check out his IG page here, with a sizeable following of 68k followers.