FAR ‘disappointed’ over share trading reinstatement refusal

Australia’s FAR Limited has expressed its disappointment with the Australian Securities Exchange’s (ASX) refusal to reinstate the trading of the company’s shares.

On 14 September 2020, FAR Limited made a request to the ASX to enter voluntary suspension of share trading to allow ASX to review the company’s half-year 2020 results and raise certain queries with FAR.

The following month, ASX advised the company that the trading of its shares would resume when FAR released a ‘clean’ audit report – free from a disclaimer of opinion with respect to an ongoing concern.

At the end of April 2021, FAR released unqualified audited financial accounts for the year ended 31 December 2020, in which the auditor stated they believe that the audit evidence obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for their opinion.

On this basis, the company applied to the Australian Securities Exchange for reinstatement of trading of its shares on Friday 30 April.

FAR said on Wednesday that the ASX requires the sale of the company’s interest in the Senegal RSSD joint venture to be completed before the reinstatement of trading its shares can be considered.

“FAR Limited is disappointed that this is the case, however, the company has no say in the matter”, the company said in the announcement.

As for the sale of the company’s interest in RSSD, it has been a long and complicated affair. Namely, it intended to sell its interest in the RSSD project to Woodside, which pre-empted the stake sale to India’s ONGC.

Then, FAR received a proposal from Remus Horizons to engage in further discussions regarding Remus’ ability to make an offer to acquire 100 per cent of the shares of the company.

A day before shareholders were supposed to approve the RSSD stake sale to Woodside, Remus Horizons made an official takeover offer for the company deferring the shareholders meeting.

The Remus deal fell through after FAR shareholders approved the sale of the RSSD project stake to Woodside in late April. The condition for Remus’ takeover was that the RSSD stake remained with the company.