Malaysian Airline Shares Gain on Khazanah's Restructuring Plan

Shares in troubled Malaysian Airline System (MAS) have gained as much as 4% as investors seem happy with the company's restructuring announced by state fund Khazanah Nasional, the majority shareholder in the company.

The shares opened 2% higher at 0.255 ringgit from 0.25 ringgit when the stock was suspended on 29 August, and rose as much as 4% at 0.26 ringgit. They are trading at 0.255 ringgit as at 7:30am BST.

Khazanah Nasional earlier announced a restructuring plan to return disaster-hit MAS to profitability by 2017.

It will take over minority shares for 1.38bn ringitt ($429m, €321m, £255m) to become the sole owner of the airline, leading to the delisting of the company from the country's stock exchange.

The 12-point plan includes creating a new company to house MAS's operations by July 2015, and spending up to 6bn ringgit to fund the restructuring exercise. As part of the plan, the company will axe 6,000 jobs, representing 30% of its workforce.

The shares are expected to be relisted by 2020 if the measures become successful.

Adding to its longstanding financial problems, MAS was hit by two major disasters in 2014.

In March, its flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing disappeared with 239 people on board. A search is under way in the Indian Ocean for the missing plane.

In July, another MAS flight heading to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam was shot down in eastern Ukraine, which is controlled by pro-Russian separatists, killing 298 people.

MAS earlier reported that its second-quarter net loss widened to 307m ringgit from 176m ringgit a year earlier.