Muscat Security Market (MSM) has temporarily suspended Galfar Engineering Co. shares, according to an announcement made on the MSM website. No other details have been divulged thus far, at the time of this report going live.

Meanwhile in a press release also issued on the MSM website today, Galfar Engineering & Contracting SAOG, issued a clarification on rumours circulating in social media with regards to a Galfar employee being involved in misappropriating OMR4mn from the company.

“With regards to the news that an employee of Galfar misappropriated OMR 4 million, we would like to clarify that this news is not true. No money has been misappropriated from the company,” Dr Hans Earlings, CEO – CEO at Galfar Engineering & Contracting SAOG, stated in the press release.

The release added that an anonymous whistleblower had informed the company about fraud by an ex-employee along with third parties and that is now subject to investigation by Public Prosecution. According to the release, there is no liability to the company in this regard.

Earlings also clarified that the delays in salaries were due to prolonged payments owed to Galfar from some of its major clients and that the company was “actively working with clients and banks to overcome this current shortfall and is committed to paying the salaries during the next week.

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Earlier in August, there were reports that Galfar had reportedly seen 9% drop in revenue due to late payments during the first half of this year thus resulting in project delays.

The financial report for the H1 2019 showed that total revenues dropped to $329.7m from $362.5m in H1 2018 and its consolidated net profit from continued operations also dropped more than 17% to $6.4m in the six months period ended June 30, 2019 compared to $7.7m in the corresponding period in 2018.