Casino operator Landing International Development (LID) was surprised last November when two individuals suddenly popped up out of nowhere, claiming to be acting as receivers of a significant amount of company shares. They asserted that they were entitled to partial ownership of the company, through its parent company, Landing International Ltd., but the claims of possession of the shares and of ownership were always seen as dubious. It now appears that the pair may not have been able to back up their claim with any tangible proof, as LID has announced that the claims have been thrown out.
LID released a notice yesterday that shares in the company would begin trading as of today after being temporarily suspended yesterday morning. The reason for the brief hiatus was due to the revelation a day earlier that the privately-held shares involved in the receivership claim had been “discharged” and the shares had been released. As a result, and to no one’s surprise, LID was not undergoing the ownership change the two receivers had tried to fabricate.
Landing, which is behind South Korea’s Jeju Shinhwa World casino resort, further indicated in its Thursday notice that “no bona fide offer has been communicated to the board” related to a potential takeover and, as a result, the board didn’t believe that any offer was “imminent.” It added, “For the purposes of the Takeovers Code, the offer period in respect of the company closed on the date of this announcement.”
LID CEO Yang Zhihui suddenly went missing in August 2018 before resurfacing a few months later. The two individuals who tried to claim receivership of the Landing shares, Glen Ho Kwok Leung and Lai Kar Ya, apparently took advantage of his departure to step in and fill the void. However, the odds of the pair ever being able to prove they were legitimate receivers of the 50.48% stake they claimed were never in their favor and Yang launched a lawsuit against them this past January. That suit appears to have had positive results.
Landing International Ltd. is registered in the British Virgin Islands and the paper trail is easy to follow. The company is listed as the owner of LID and, at the top of the pyramid, Yang is the only shareholder in the entity. Leung and Ya, at one time reportedly working for the Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu LLC financial audit firm, will just have to figure out another way to become instant captains of industry.
