Wednesday 16 April 2014

1MDB: Debt ballooned to RM 42 Billion?

Article in the Business Times (Singapore), which raises many questions:

Why are the accounts for the year ended March 2013 of 1MDB delayed for such a long time?

Why does 1MDB need RM 42,300,000,000.00 in debt (per March 31, 2013)? This amount is hugely up from RM 8.4 Billion the year before.

The fund made a profit of RM 778 Million, which looks ok, but it needs again a property revaluation of RM 2.7 Billion (without which it would have shown a loss).

Also, the profit as percentage on equity plus debt does not look that impressive.

More from the article:

"... the fund has come under fire for overpaying for the power assets. 1MDB forked out RM 10.85 billion for these, mostly old plants nearing the end of their concessions.

The latest accounts which reveal an impairment loss on goodwill back up the view that 1MDB could indeed have overpaid for those power assets."

And:

"Market observers say that the fund's growing debt obligations are causing some unease in the country's banking circles as well as regulator Bank Negara Malaysia.

"This is potentially a big risk and it's in everyone's interest to monitor the situation closely." said an insider.

The whole idea of a large government fund with very little transparency, buying over certain assets (power, land etc.), bundling some of them together and then bringing them to Bursa in the form of an IPO, I fail to see the benefits of that, in the contrary. 

As a seasoned banker said in the article:

"This is not value creation. It's not a sustainable strategy, more so for a long-term diversified company".

1 comment:

  1. Hello Sir..

    I am also not agree with the 1MDB thing. May I ask about your opinion and knowledge, this case are more giving profit to whom?

    Thanks for ur answer

    ReplyDelete