Despite several rounds of clarification by both companies, the SET yesterday still demanded the two explain additional information by next Wednesday.

The latest clarification submitted by the two companies included information that was different from what had been submitted on September 29.

The SET asked Bliss-Tel to explain why its latest clarification differed from the earlier one, which said Seamico Securities had been appointed financial adviser and that both companies had appointed the securities firm to appraise IEC Mobile's asset value.

IEC and Bliss-Tel had earlier informed the SET they had used Seamico Securities' appraised price of IEC Mobile as a benchmark for a deal involving the issue of 47 million capital-increase shares in exchange for IEC Mobile's assets.

However, the latest clarification from Bliss-Tel, submitted to the SET on Thursday, said the financial-advisory contract between Bliss-Tel and Seamico carried no authorised signature from either party.

Thus, the SET believes the latest report was not prepared by Seamico, which is an authorised financial adviser endorsed by the Securities and Exchange Commission. It suspects instead that the information the IEC board used to consider prices and which Dragon One, financial adviser to Bliss-Tel, used to adjust the report for Bliss-Tel's board to consider IEC Mobile's value may not have been credible or in the best interests of either company's shareholders.

The SET has asked the boards of IEC and Bliss-Tel to consider whether appraised prices that were not determined by an authorised financial adviser had affected their decision-making. If so, the SET would like the two companies to submit a time frame for resolving the issue. If not, both firms should explain why the unauthorised appraised prices had no effect.

Earlier, IEC and Bliss-Tel reported that IEC Mobile's assets as of June 30 had a book value of Bt10.51 million, while Seamico Securities priced it at Bt314.34 million and another of Bliss-Tel's financial advisers estimated it at Bt213.44 million.

IEC informed the SET yesterday that an error occurred while typing in information. An earlier version that said IEC and Bliss-Tel had jointly hired Seamico to appraise IEC Mobile was incorrect. The correct version is that IEC hired Seamico to appraise the value of Bliss-Tel's retail-phone business, while Bliss-Tel hired Seamico to appraise IEC Mobile's business value.

Siriporn Chanjindamanee

The Nation