At its meeting on 27 October 2004, the Board of Oslo Børs resolved to admit shares in Active 24 ASA to listing on Oslo Børs. At the same meeting the Board resolved to impose a violation charge of NOK 100,000 on Petroleum Geo-Services ASA for a breach of the Stock Exchange Regulations, and to issue a warning to Smedvig ASA for a breach of the Stock Exchange Regulations.
Active 24 ASA to be listed on the SMB List
The Board of Oslo Børs resolved to admit shares in Active 24 ASA to listing on the SMB List of Oslo Børs. Admission to listing is conditional on the company producing a prospectus that satisfies the requirements of the Stock Exchange Regulations for a new listing. The Board authorised the President of Oslo Børs to fix the date of the first day of listing, which is to be no later than 24 November 2004.
About Active 24:
Active 24 is a pan-European provider of Internet hosting services. The company focuses on providing small and medium-sized companies with complete and cost efficient Internet solutions that combine relevant, scalable and standardised products and a high degree of user-friendliness. The company’s product portfolio comprises web hotels, domain name registration, e-mail solutions, e-commerce solutions, server operations over the internet and outsourcing, as well as a range of additional products related to these areas.
Violation charge imposed on Petroleum Geo-Services ASA
The Board of Oslo Børs resolved to impose a violation charge of NOK 100,000 on Petroleum Geo-Services ASA for the company’s failure to adopt its 2003 annual report and accounts within the required timetable.
Further to the main principle set out in the Stock Exchange Regulations, the Board of PGS should have formally adopted its recommendation for the company's 2003 annual accounts before 1 April 2004. However the Stock Exchange Appeals Committee, in response to a request from the company, agreed a new deadline of 2 June 2004.
In the event, PGS did not manage to formally adopt its recommendation for the company's 2003 annual accounts within this extended deadline. No further extension to the deadline was granted. The Board of PGS did not adopt its recommendation for the company's 2003 annual accounts until 16 June 2004. The company therefore breached the deadline for approval by 14 days.
This decision may be appealed to the Oslo Børs Appeals Committee. Any appeal must be submitted within two weeks.
Warning to Smedvig ASA
The Stock Exchange Regulations stipulate that a listed company must ensure that no unauthorised party gains access to the company's interim reports prior to publication through the Oslo Børs Company Disclosure System. However, a number of players in the market managed to gain access to information contained in Smedvig's 2004 second quarter interim report through the company's web site before the report was published. One of the consequences of this was the publication of Smedvig's profit and loss figures by the media before the figures were published through the Oslo Børs Company Disclosure System.
Smedvig has explained that it was possible to access the second quarter interim report prior to its publication simply by changing two characters in the address field on a web browser for its previous interim report - i.e. replacing Q1 by Q2. This meant that it was very easy for anyone with access to the Internet to gain access to information that the company was required to keep secret until it was published through the Oslo Børs Company Disclosure System.
Oslo Børs takes the view that Smedvig did not have satisfactory systems and routines in place to prevent the leak of the contents of its interim report for the second quarter of 2004 to some players in the market. Since the companies were not aware of this problem, the Board decided not to impose a violation charge in this case. However, the Board pointed out that if companies fail to exercise sufficient care in the future it will consider imposing violation charges.
The Board of Oslo Børs resolved to issue a warning to Smedvig ASA for this breach of the Stock Exchange Regulations.
