Chinese distant-water fishing company Pingtan Marine was late filing its Form 10-K with the NASDAQ Stock Exchange because the firm has “had difficulty obtaining certain financial data.”
Pingtan announced on 19 April that it had received a notice from the NASDAQ’s listing qualifications department indicating that, because of the firm’s delay in filing its annual report – its Form 10-K – with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for the fiscal year ended 31 December, Pingtan is “not in compliance with the timely filing requirement for continued listing under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5250(c)(1).”
While the notice has no impact on the firm’s listing or share trading, Pingtan has until 14 June to reply to NASDAQ’s notification. It said in a statement to investors that it is “working diligently” to complete the Form 10-K.
Meanwhile, Pingtan’s home province of Fujian has reported a sharp rise in its distant-water catch in 2020. At 670,000 metric tons (MT), the 2020 catch total was up 17 percent year-on-year, while the province’s domestic marine catch fell by 5.13 percent to 1.5 million MT. The province exceeded national targets thanks to growth in distant-water fishing and mariculture – it recorded a 3.15 percent rise in mariculture output to 5.26 million MT, according to the statement from the provincial Ocean & Fisheries Bureau.
In December 2020, Pingtan was hit with a visa sanctions ban by the U.S. State Department for alleged involvement in illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing.
Earlier this year, the company issued a notice that the discovery of new fishing stocks in international waters would boost its 2021 revenues by 100 percent or more.
Photo courtesy of Pingtan Marine
