SINGAPORE (BLOOMBERG) – Asset sales in a liquidation process at Hyflux, Singapore’s highest-profile distressed company, would likely bring in less than $200 million, a person familiar with the matter said, a fraction of the amount creditors are claiming.
Hyflux’s judicial manager Borrelli Walsh filed a court application earlier this month to wind up the water treatment and power company, and said there are six bids involving individual assets.
There is no specific timeline to sell these assets, but the judicial manager aims to do so as soon as possible, according to the person, who asked not to be identified because the matter is private.
Proceeds of that size from the liquidation would confirm creditors’ concerns that they may get little back from the company, which began a court-supervised debt restructuring process in 2018 and faced about $2.8 billion in total investor claims.
Investors in the once high-flying firm include about 34,000 individuals who put money in products including perpetual notes and preference shares. They are owed about $900 million in total.
Borrelli Walsh, which has been in charge of Hyflux since November last year, said in its statement earlier this month that the remaining value of the Hyflux group would be best realised in a liquidation.
Mr Patrick Bance, a Singapore-based director at Borrelli Walsh, declined to comment when asked about the asset sale forecasts.
One of the bidders for Hyflux assets is Singapore’s Keppel Infrastructure Trust, according to the person. It is interested in the TuasOne waste-to-energy plant and the remaining 30 per cent stake in the SingSpring desalination plant that it does not own already, the person said.
Keppel Infrastructure has contractual rights to acquire the 30 per cent stake in the SingSpring plant and to take over the operations, and that is unaffected by the liquidation proceedings, the firm’s spokesman said in an e-mail response to Bloomberg queries.
The company is unable to comment further due to ongoing confidential discussions with Hyflux’s judicial manager, the spokesman said.