Businessman Harry Jayawardena and related parties are believed to have increased exposure in diversified conglomerate John Keels Holdings (JKH) recently. Over the past few weeks JKH has been responsible for the bulk of foreign buying and selling in the market. Through his holding company Melstacorp, Mr. Jayawardena already owns a 3.5 per cent in the [...]

Business Times

Harry buys JKH shares

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Businessman Harry Jayawardena and related parties are believed to have increased exposure in diversified conglomerate John Keels Holdings (JKH) recently.

Over the past few weeks JKH has been responsible for the bulk of foreign buying and selling in the market. Through his holding company Melstacorp, Mr. Jayawardena already owns a 3.5 per cent in the conglomerate and analysts noted that he is open to buy more.

On October 25, there was 2.3 million JKH shares net foreign selling. Last Monday there was foreign selling of 20,051,671 JKH shares. On Tuesday, the stock hit Rs. 148 after recently slumping to unprecedented lows.

Some traders are expecting the change in government to get the state institutions to start sending more money into the stock market. This will likely push up JKH along with other shares, they said. The Captain family owns some 19 per cent in JKH while nearly 60 per cent of the shares are owned by foreign institutions. During the past month most of the foreign funds were selling this share.

Meanwhile, JKH which is the only major listed company that does not have a controlling shareholder, is having its own set of issues.

The resort sector arm of the John Keells Group saw its earnings for the September quarter (2Q19) fall and company’s resort sector profit for 2019 fell 99 per cent year-on-year (YoY) to Rs. 850 million.

Bentota Beach by Cinnamon was closed for complete renovation last July, is to open this month. JKH operates seven hotels and 864 guest rooms in Sri Lanka and three hotels and 340 rooms in the Maldives.

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