Singapore-listed Ascendas Hospitality Trust (A-HTRUST) (SGX:Q1P) has requested for a trading halt of its units on the Singapore Exchange at around 7.30 am this morning. This is the second time the Trust has requested for a trading halt within a space of 2 months.

Park Hotel Clarke Quay will be Ascendas Hospitality Trust's first property in Singapore.

It is believed that the trading halt is in connection with A-HTRUST's proposal to carry out an equity fund raising comprising an offering of 226,352,625 new stapled securities in Ascendas Hospitality Trust. It plans to raise no less that S$200 million to fund its acquisition of Park Hotel Clarke Quay by issuing a private placement of 161,947,000 new stapled securities at an issue price of between S$0.885 and S$0.915 per unit. This would raise about S$143.3 million.

The rest will be done through through preferential offering of 64,405,625 new stapled securities on the basis of 2 new stapled securities for every 25 existing stapled securities in A-HTRUST held as at 5.00 p.m. on 7 June 2013 at an issue price of between S$0.880 and S$0.905 per new unit. This would raise a further 56.7 million. The preferential offering represents a discount of about 3 percent to 6 percent of prevailing unit prices for A-HTRUST. Its units closed the last trading day at S$0.925.

The offer price of the new units will be decided and announced at a later date and will be coordinated jointly by DBS Bank Limited and Standard Chartered Securities.