A public offering ... takes an average period of eight months to prepare.

New draft prakas on Cambodia's future stock exchange considers public and private offerings

THE Securities and Exchange Commission of Cambodia (SECC) continued Friday to work on the necessary legislation ahead of the launch of the stock exchange by holding a consultation session relating to a draft edict on public and private offerings.

Attended by the representatives of 130 companies from both the public and private sector, the session looked at the planned prakas on issuing equity securities.

The SECC draft said that private placements would relate to a small personal offering of no more than 30 investors. For companies with equity of less than 20 billion riels (US$4.8 million), the issue could not exceed 20 percent, the draft added, whereas those over this threshold would not be able to exceed 15 percent during any one 12-month period.

“These are the most important conditions for a company that wishes to issue equity securities,” said Chhun Sambath, director of the department of securities issuances at the SECC.

For public offerings, equity would be set at a minimum of 5 billion riels on the date the application is lodged, according to the draft. A required minimum net profit would be set at 500 million riels for the most recent full financial year, and the aggregate of profit should not be below 1 billion riels for the previous three financial years.

“For a company that wants to make a public offering, it takes an average period of eight months to prepare documents and to do an evaluation,” SECC Director General Ming Bankosal said Friday.

Last month the government passed two prakas related to the new exchange, which is expected to begin trading at the end of 2010 following a soft launch at the beginning of the year.

The first prakas covered the granting of approval to operators in the securities market and their requirements, whereas the second covered licensing of firms and representatives of firms operating in the industry.