Xurpas trading suspension lifted 16 months after Wavemaker miscue

After a 16-month suspension, the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) will allow technology firm Xurpas Inc. to resume trading on its bourse on Monday, Jan. 17, after the latter submitted a comprehensive disclosure on its aborted backdoor-listing deal with US-based Wavemaker group.

“This is, however, without prejudice to any action that may be undertaken by the Exchange pursuant to its rules, in connection with any event and circumstance and/or any related matter that may hereafter be made known to the Exchange,” the PSE said in an advisory.

Considering that the trading of Xurpas shares had been suspended since Sept. 21, 2020, the static threshold or trading band on the price of its shares will be lifted upon the resumption of trading of shares on Jan. 17.

A company’s stock price is allowed to go up by as much as 50 percent and go down by as much as 30 percent in a single trading day.

The buy-in deal was touted as the gateway for Xurpas to enter the vibrant US tech investing arena and participate in the hunt for unicorns.

Using its own stocks as currency, Xurpas was supposed to buy Wavemaker Partners US, a venture capital management firm based in Los Angeles, while the general partners of Wavemaker were to subscribe to unissued shares of Xurpas equivalent to a 48-percent stake, diluting the shares of Xurpas founders Nix Nolledo, Fernando Jude Garcia and Raymond Racaza.

To date, no Xurpas shares had been issued in favor of Wavemaker group. Xurpas also did not receive any shares in Wavemaker pursuant to the earlier deal.

Xurpas later received a written notification from Filipino-born entrepreneur turned venture capitalist Frederick Manlunas of the Wavemaker Group terminating the deal, citing failure to close the transaction by Dec. 31, 2020.

“The company would like to stress that substantially all the improvements in the company’s business for the past two years were achieved by Xurpas itself, independent of Wavemaker,” Xurpas said in its letter to the PSE.

While Xurpas provided limited enterprise services to Wavemaker’s affiliates, it noted that revenues generated from these comprised only 2 percent of total revenues during the period.

—Doris Dumlao-Abadilla