The pressure on China Aircraft Leasing Group’s shares is expected to continue this week, as the company was unable to contact its former CEO Poon Ho Man, who resigned last week without explanation.
In a statement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Friday, the company said Poon had resigned on June 17 with immediate effect and had provided no explanation. According to China Aircraft Leasing, the CEO had been on leave since the 18th of May and was due to return this Friday.
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According to Reuters, the 20% drop of the company share on Friday, wiped HK$1.36bn (£111m) off the company’s market capitalisation. Shares were suspended from trading on Thursday.
Chief financial officer Yu Tai Tei also resigned on the 22th of May, with effect from the 18th of June, "to pursue other personal goals", the company said on Friday.
Various news reports have alleged Poon of being involved in Chinese authorities’ corruption probe regarding China Southern Airlines.
The company wrote in a statement that it has not been informed by the Chinese government that Poon "is under any kind of investigation".
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By GlobalDataThe concerns around China Aircraft Leasing coincides with Hong Kong’s regulators increased scrutiny of listed firms, after Chinese solar energy firm Hanergy Thin Film Power shares lost 47% of their value in minutes on the 20th of May.
This week, the company’s shared recovered a small portion of the losses witnessed last Friday.
Despite the big drop in share prices, Reuters reported that the two biggest shareholders in China Aircraft Leasing Group had no plans to cut their stake in the lessor.
On Friday, the company delivered a new Airbus A320-200 aircraft to Sichuan Airlines. The delivery also marked the lessor’s milestone of expanding its fleet size to 50 aircrafts, all under operating lease.
