Asian stocks looked set for a cautious start Thursday after U.S. equities eked out another record high amid renewed optimism over U.S. stimulus talks and vaccine approval. Treasury yields ticked higher and the dollar touched a more than two-year low. Futures were little changed in Japan and slightly higher in Hong Kong and Australia. The S&P 500 closed at another all-time high, led by gains in energy stocks.

Japanese-managed precision-components maker CDW Holding made a US$46,000 net profit for the nine months ended September, reversing the US$1.94 million loss from a year ago. Its revenue for the period rose 7.9 per cent year on year to US$76.18 million, the mainboard-listed firm disclosed in a Wednesday business update filed with the bourse.

Geo Energy Resources has hit the minimum threshold for its coal reserves, such that the mainboard-listed firm will not have to make a mandatory offer to purchase the 8 per cent senior notes issued by its wholly-owned unit, Geo Coal International. In a bourse filing on Wednesday evening, Geo Energy said that it had 87.5 million tonnes of coal reserves in its two Indonesian mining concessions, Sungai Danau Jaya (SDJ) and Tanah Bumbu Resources (TBR), as of end-April. This exceeds the minimum requirement of 80 million tonnes of regulatory-compliant coal reserves that it had to meet.

Credit Bureau Asia (CBA) received applications from retail investors for 60.8 times the number of shares available in the public portion of its initial public offering (IPO), it announced on Wednesday. With 1.5 million shares available to the public for subscription, it received more than 4,000 valid applications for about 91.3 million shares, with application monies received amounting to S$84.9 million. Additionally, the credit- and risk-information solutions provider also attracted "strong interest" for its 28.5 million placement shares from institutional and other investors.

There is "nothing unusual or improper" about the voting procedures adopted for the proposed merger of Sabana Shari'ah Compliant Industrial Real Estate Investment Trust (Sabana Reit) and ESR-Reit. Sabana Reit's manager made that point in a bourse filing on Wednesday morning in response to concerns raised by the deal's key opponents, adding that the procedures apply equally to all unitholders of the trust. The voting procedures are also the same as those adopted in all Reit mergers in Singapore to date, in that unitholders - including nominee companies and custodians - were only allowed to appoint one proxy, and unitholders could only vote their units in one direction.

Source: SGX Masnet, The Business Times, Bloomberg, Channel NewsAsia, Reuters, PSR