The article on Banks DIH Ltd. in Stabroek Business of November 26, captioned "Of white knights and down raids" refers to a full page ad related to take-overs and insider trading.
In Banks DIH's ad, they apparently questioned the decisions of the Guyana Association of Securities Companies and Intermediaries Inc (GASCI). Was the Council's one page ad referring to the insider trading at GASCI, knowing that they would have price sensitive information not known to the wider public?
The writer in this article refers to the fast foods producing marginal returns. In a previous article dated March 5, 2004, Ram & Mc Rae said, "With regards to the Foods Division Business Page had always questioned the wisdom of the expansion of the several food outlets." The question is, is Ram & Mc Rae the writer of the article "Of white knights and dawn raids", as both articles refer to the restaurants. Is he one of the prominent persons Kaieteur News refers to who are being named in the drive to acquire the majority shares in Banks DIH? If so, there can be a major conflict as he consistently writes negative articles about Banks DIH and can be accused of setting the stage.
The writer continues by saying that "Council is following the trading activity closely and has not concluded that the increased volumes are based on privileged information," yet the analyst disclosed that Banks held a board meeting last week and made an early announcement of its final dividend of $0.28. How did he acquire this information? He then went on to talk of take-overs and rules that govern them saying, among other things, that "Absolute secrecy shall be maintained."
I urge citizens and shareholders to take cognizance of these issues.
Yours faithfully,
Terence James
Editor's note:
The article "of white knights and dawn raids" was not written by Mr Ram. The actual quote from the article is "The council is following the information closely but at this stage has not concluded that the increased volumes (of the sale of Banks DIH shares) are based on privileged information as opposed to speculation based on rumour."
The information on Banks DIH dividend was already publicly available and is reported in the same issue.
As regards "prominent persons Kaieteur News refers to who are being named in the drive to acquire the majority shares in Banks DIH" we are sending a copy of this letter to Mr Ram for any comments he may wish to make.