Small cap news round-up
Symphony International reported a 4.3% increase in its net asset value for the three months ending on 30 June, in comparison to the previous quarter, to reach $712.5m.
The London-listed investor in fast-growing Asian consumer businesses attributed the rise to gains in the share prices of its three major investments, Minor International, IHH Healthcare Berhad and Parkway Life Real Estate Investment Trust alongside the appreciation in the value of several South East Asian currencies versus the US dollar, such as the Thai baht, the Singapore dollar and the Malaysian ringgit.
Akers Biosciences has reached a settlement agreement with former distributor ChubeWorkx Guernsey Ltd, allowing it to recover $1.25m in product and cash and end a lengthy legal dispute between the pair.
ChubeWorkx would recover what it was owed from a promissory note by taking delivery of $0.75m of BreathScan alcohol detectors. It would re-sell these. ChubeWorkx would also receive $0.5m cash.
Shares in Fox Marble were down more than 1% as its 2016 order-book value fell to €4m, down €0.5m on the year due to sterling's weakness following UK's non-binding Brexit vote in June.
A revised order from a customer was also a factor, the company said.
However, directors noted they were beginning to see progress not only in increasing the order book, but also conversion of the order book into sales.
Polo Resources said investee company Blackham Resources has raised about A$25m by placing roughly 25m new A$1 shares to fast-track expansion plans at the 5.1Moz Matilda Gold Project.
The raising was oversubscribed and received strong institutional support.
Shares in 21st Century dumped more than a third of their value as the company warned full-year revenue would be lower on the year, resulting in a significant loss for the 12-month period.
"It was anticipated that the slow start to the year would be followed by a pick-up in trading in H2 although this is proving slower to materialise," the company said.
AIM-listed Immedia Group said on Friday that it is seeing much higher-than-expected uptake of its Subway radio streaming platform by franchisees, further to the contract announced back in April.
The company, which supplies digital audio content solutions, said it expects uptake to accelerate further in the next financial year as the service is rolled out across existing stores and new franchises are opened.
InfraStrata repaid its loan from Baron Oil early but modified the terms of its loan agreement, extending the latter's right to buy into its Islandmagee development in exchange for a cash payment.
In May 2015, Baron provided €1.8m to fund Infrastrata's working capital requirements until it completed the work programme for the Islandmagee gas storage project in Northern Ireland, which would release a grant of equal size from the European Commission.
Stellar Diamonds announced the LSE would suspend trading in its shares pending the announcement of a potential reverse takeover.
Trading in shares of West Africa-focused Stellar would thus be suspended pending the submission of the prerequisite admission document, which in turn would require the prior approval of the company's shareholders for the transaction.
Independent Oil and Gas first operated appraisal well on its Skipper discovery failed to encounter hydrocarbons but confirmed the commerciality of the field, according to the company's directors.
Skipper lay in Block 9/21a in license P1609 in the Norther Sea.
The well was drilled to a total depth of 5,578ft and achieved its primary objective of retrieving good quality reservoir condition oil samples with which to progress with the field development plan.