(Alliance News) - NMC Health PLC on Wednesday said it will respond to Muddy Waters Capital LLC's "unfounded" claims in due course.
On Wednesday, NMC shares were up 6.1% in London at 1,853.50 pence each, making the stock the top blue-chip performer. On Tuesday, the stock slumped 32%.
Muddy Waters, which was founded by short-seller Carson Block, on Tuesday said: "We have serious doubts about the company's financial statements, including its asset values, cash balance, reported profit, and reported debt levels."
Short selling is an investment or trading strategy that speculates on the decline in a stock.
NMC on Wednesday said it "understands" its regulatory disclosure obligations and "has nothing to add to disclosures already made". The company added that it has already responded to many of the allegations made in the report over the past 12 months.
"NMC will review the assertions, insinuations and accusations made in the report, which appear principally unfounded, baseless and misleading, containing many errors of fact, and will respond in detail in due course," the company said in a statement Wednesday.
NMC reaffirmed its trading and operational guidance for both 2019 and 2020.
The FTSE 100 constituent also on Wednesday said it will commence a share buyback of up to USD200 million, a move which was approved by shareholders earlier in December.
The repurchase of shares will start on Wednesday and will end no later than either NMC's 2020 annual general meeting or June 30 next year. The maximum number of shares that will be bought back pursuant to the programme is 20.9 million, the company noted.
The purpose of the buyback programme is to reduce the share capital of the company, it explained, and therefore all shares repurchased will be cancelled.
Seperately, Finablr PLC - which ended down 11% on Tuesday - noted "recent volatility" in its share price, and said there was "no financial or operational reason" for this.
The FTSE 250 constituent was down 1.2% at 185.00p early Wednesday.
Travelex owner Finablr was founded by Bavaguthu Raghuram Shetty, who also founded NMC. Shetty is joint chair of NMC Health and also co-chair of Finablr.
Finablr said it remains on track to achieve the guidance set out at its IPO, which was reaffirmed in November.
By Evelina Grecenko; evelinagrecenko@alliancenews.com
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