Hanergy Thin Film’s Shares Suspended from Trading

Wednesday saw the shares of Hanergy Thin Film Power Group Ltd plummeting as much as 47 percent, before being altogether suspended from trading, pending a company announcement. The fall cost the firm about $19 billion in market capitalization in just about half an hour.

Hanergy Thin Film Power Group Ltd, the subsidiary of Beijing-based Hanergy Holding Group Ltd, is a Chinese solar company, engaged in producing equipment and turnkey production lines for manufacturing of amorphous silicon based thin film solar photovoltaic modules. Presently, Hanergy Group and its associates hold about 30.6 billion shares in Hanergy Thin Film.

The plunge in the solar-panel producer’s stock was defended by its parent. Hanergy Holding Group appeased investors by ruling out any possibility of overdue debt and maintained that its operations were working normally.

In a series of statements released by the group on Wednesday, the first called for suspension in the trading of shares. The following statement asked for a complete close down of trading until further announcement from the company. Since then, no further statements have been issued via the Hong Kong stock exchange.

However, in the five-paragraph statement released on the parent company website on Thursday, the group said Hanergy did not use its stocks for derivatives trading, emphasizing that it is confident in the development of the listed company. However, no mention of the affiliate’s fate was made.

Rather, the parent company maintained that the group was functioning normally and was not under any debt burden. The statement did not even talk about a recent Reuters report, wherein the media major hinted at manipulation in shares. Neither was any mention about the group’s Chairman Li Hejun’s absence from an annual shareholder meeting.

Li, who has not publically spoken about the share plunge, however, was a part of a clean-energy exhibition in Beijing on Wednesday.