Eco-Shop jumps on debut, minting a new Malaysian billionaire
The stock jumped as much as 10.6 per cent in early trading, before paring gains to close 6.2 per cent higher at RM1.20. Eco-Shop, which sells household items at a fixed price of RM2.60 (S$0.79), raised RM974 million in an offering that valued the company at about US$1.5 billion. That's the most since an IPO by 99 Speed Mart Retail Holdings in September.
The time could not have been better for Eco-Shop, according to chief executive officer Jessica Ng. 'If you look at the current economic situation, our business model is even more needed. We stretch the ringgit for many, many people,' Ng said in a Bloomberg News interview.
Potential income growth for most of the population over the next two years would also ensure 'a big catchment' and room to expand, she added. The US dollar-store operator plans to use proceeds from the share sale to add 70 outlets per year for the next five years, essentially doubling its store count.
The debut is a positive sign for Malaysia's market, whose momentum after the 55 IPOs it saw in 2024 was derailed by tariffs. Although Eco-Shop's IPO shares were eventually priced lower, the listing shows there is still traction for low-cost mass consumer brands among investors.
Founded by Lee Kar Whatt and his partners in 2003, Eco-Shop has grown to 350 stores across Malaysia. Lee – who will end up with a US$1.15 billion stake post-listing, according to the Bloomberg billionaires Index – still works out of the company's headquarters in Jementah, a small town located in the southern state of Johor.
A NEWSLETTER FOR YOU
Friday, 8.30 am Asean Business
Business insights centering on South-east Asia's fast-growing economies.
Sign Up
Sign Up
The company is looking to expand the portfolio of its in-house brands, which make up more than half of sales, to have better control over cost and quality. Ng said the group also has mechanisms in place that allow it to keep the cost of imported products at a minimum.
Eco-Shop, which sells everything from snacks to stationery and cleaning products, reported a 45 per cent on-year increase in net profit to RM61.7 million for the three months through February. Revenue jumped 17 per cent to RM736 million.
No doubt, competition has intensified in recent years, particularly from established rivals like Mr DIY Group (M) and smaller upstarts run by entrepreneurs from mainland China. But Ng said Eco-Shop can carve out its own niche, given its 68 per cent market share in the country's discount-store sector.
Ng, who previously worked at multinationals, said Malaysian brands are generally 'operationally good' and many of them have become 'irreplaceable' due to the scale they have achieved in their respective categories. Resilient domestic demand will continue to help local chains like Eco-Shop thrive, she said. BLOOMBERG
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Straits Times
an hour ago
- Straits Times
Visa's war rooms in Singapore, US and UK take on global cyber criminals
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox - In the heart of Data Centre Alley – a patch of suburban Washington where much of the world's internet traffic flows – Visa operates its global fraud command centre. The payments giant maintains identical facilities in London and Singapore, ensuring 24-hour global vigilance. The numbers that Visa grapples with are enormous. Every year, US$15 trillion (S$19 trillion) flows through its networks, representing roughly 15 per cent of the world's economy. And bad actors constantly try to syphon off some of that money. Modern fraudsters vary dramatically in sophistication. To stay ahead, Visa has invested US$12 billion over the past five years building artificial intelligence-powered cyber fraud detection capabilities, knowing that criminals are also spending big. 'You have everybody from a single individual threat actor looking to make a quick buck all the way to really corporatised criminal organisations that generate tens or hundreds of millions of dollars annually from fraud and scam activities,' Visa's global head of fraud solutions Michael Jabbara told AFP during a tour of the company's security campus in Ashburn, Virginia. 'These organisations are very structured in how they operate.' Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. Singapore Construction starts on Cross Island Line phase 2; 6 MRT stations in S'pore's west ready by 2032 Singapore New SkillsFuture requirements by April 2026 to mandate regular training for adult educators Singapore MPs should not ask questions to 'clock numbers'; focus should be improving S'poreans' lives: Seah Kian Peng Singapore Sequencing and standards: Indranee on role of Leader of the House Singapore NUS College draws 10,000 applications for 400 places, showing strong liberal arts interest Life Rock band My Chemical Romance to perform in Singapore in April 2026 Singapore Life After... blazing biomedical research trail in S'pore: Renowned scientist breaks new ground at 59 Singapore More students in Singapore juggle studying and working to support their families The best-resourced criminal syndicates now focus on scams that directly target consumers, enticing them into purchases or transactions by manipulating their emotions. 'Consumers are continuously vulnerable. They can be exploited, and that's where we've seen a much higher incidence of attacks recently,' Mr Jabbara said. The most up-to-date fraud techniques are systematic and quietly devastating. Once criminals obtain your card information, they automatically distribute it across numerous merchant websites that generate small recurring charges – amounts low enough that victims may not notice for months. Some of these operations increasingly resemble legitimate tech companies, offering services and digital products to fraudsters much like Google or Microsoft cater to businesses. On the dark web, criminals can purchase comprehensive fraud toolkits. Said Mr Jabbara: 'You can buy the software. You can buy a tutorial on how to use the software. You can get access to a mule network on the ground or you can get access to a bot network to carry out denial-of-service attacks that overwhelm servers with traffic, effectively shutting them down.' Just as cloud computing lowered barriers for start-ups by eliminating the need to build servers, 'the same type of trend has happened in the cyber crime and fraud space', he explained. These off-the-shelf services can also enable bad actors to launch brute force attacks on an industrial scale – using repeated payment attempts to crack a card's number, expiry date and security code. The sophistication extends to corporate-style management, Mr Jabbara said. Some criminal organisations now employ chief risk officers who determine operational risk appetite. They might decide that targeting government infrastructure and hospitals generates an excessive amount of attention from law enforcement and is too risky to pursue. 'Millions of attacks' To combat these unprecedented threats, Mr Jabbara leads a payment scam disruption team focused on understanding criminal methodologies. From a small room called the Risk Operations Centre in Virginia, employees analyse data streams on multiple screens, searching for patterns that distinguish fraudulent activity from legitimate credit card use. In the larger Cyber Fusion Centre, staff monitor potential cyber attacks targeting Visa's own infrastructure around the clock. 'We deal with millions of attacks across different parts of our network,' Mr Jabbara noted, emphasising that most are handled automatically without human intervention. AFP
Business Times
an hour ago
- Business Times
Richard Li's FWD Group falls in Hong Kong debut after HK$3.5 billion IPO
[HONG KONG] Billionaire Richard Li's FWD Group Holdings declined in its trading debut in Hong Kong after raising HK$3.5 billion (S$569 million) in an initial public offering (IPO), a bid to capitalise on the city's listing resurgence years after its initial try. The insurer's stock fell as much as 2.5 per cent on Monday (Jul 7) after selling 91.3 million shares at HK$38 apiece. The shares slipped in grey-market trading on Jul 4. The IPO values the company at more than US$6 billion, according to deal terms seen by Bloomberg. Mubadala Capital and Japan's T&D Holdings were its cornerstone investors, according to a filing. The debut comes after the tycoon, son of famed Hong Kong businessman Li Ka-shing, tried to take the company public in New York in 2021, which was abandoned after regulatory scrutiny. Subsequent efforts to list at home in Hong Kong were stalled as the city's IPO entered a prolonged slump. Now, with Hong Kong's equity markets rebounding, Li is seizing a more favourable window to raise capital for the crown jewel of his business empire. Investors' sentiment has been buoyed by a wave of multibillion-dollar deals, with IPOs and follow-on offerings raising US$37.4 billion so far in 2025 – the highest since the record-breaking year of 2021 and a sharp jump from US$5.1 billion during the same period last year. The city's stock benchmark, the Hang Seng Index, has risen about 20 per cent for the year. Insurers have been particularly hot lately, with shares of AIA Group and Prudential each rising at least 35 per cent since their April lows. Richard Li, who founded the company in 2013, owns a 66.5 per cent stake in FWD through various corporate entities. His stake in FWD accounts for two-thirds of his US$6.1 billion net worth at the IPO price, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The insurer plans to use the proceeds to reduce debt, support growth and enhance its digital capabilities. BLOOMBERG
Business Times
2 hours ago
- Business Times
Oil tumbles as Opec+ hikes August output more than expected
[SINGAPORE] Oil prices slipped more than 1 per cent on Monday after Opec+ surprised markets by hiking output more than expected in August, raising concerns about oversupply. Brent crude futures fell 80 cents, or 1.2 per cent, to US$67.50 a barrel by 0010 GMT, while US West Texas Intermediate crude was at US$65.68, down US$1.32, or 2 per cent. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and their allies, a group known as Opec+, agreed on Saturday to raise production by 548,000 barrels per day in August. 'The increased production clearly represents a more aggressive competition for market share and some tolerance for the resulting decline in price and revenue,' said Tim Evans of Evans Energy in a note. The August increase represents a jump from monthly increases of 411,000 bpd Opec+ had approved for May, June and July, and 138,000 bpd in April. Opec+ cited a steady global economic outlook and healthy market fundamentals, including low oil inventories, as reasons for releasing more oil. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up The decision will bring nearly 80 per cent of the 2.2 million bpd voluntary cuts from eight Opec producers back in the market, RBC Capital analysts led by Helima Croft said in a note. However, the actual output increase has been smaller than planned so far and most of the supply has been from Saudi Arabia, they added. In a show of confidence in oil demand, Saudi Arabia on Sunday raised the August price for its flagship Arab Light crude to a four-month high for Asia. Goldman analysts expect Opec+ to announce a final 550,000 bpd increase for September at the next meeting on Aug 3. Separately, the United States is close to finalising several trade agreements in the coming days and will notify other countries of higher tariff rates by July 9, US President Donald Trump said on Sunday, with the higher rates scheduled to take effect on Aug 1. REUTERS
