SINGAPORE (Nov 20): UOL Group has increased its stake in United Industrial Corporation (UIC) to 49.78% or roughly 712.9 million shares.

The increase came after UOL's wholly owned subsidiary UOL Equity Investments purchased approximately 11.8 million UIC shares on Monday at $3.3072 each.

Of the total number of shares purchased, 85,000 shares were acquired in the open market while 9.6 million shares were acquired from the subsidiaries of Haw Par Corporation, 1.9 million from UOL chairman Wee Cho Yaw, 70,640 shares from an associate of UOL, CEO Gwee Lian Kheng and 143,417 from UOL director Wee Sin Tho.

The acquisitions undertaken were in line with the company's objective of consolidating its interest in UIC to achieve statutory control of UIC in the future, says UOL said in a regulatory filing.

See: UOL a step closer to achieving ‘statutory control’ of UIC in share swap deal with Haw Par

See: UOL Group inching up stake in UIC

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Shares in UIC closed at $3.30 on Monday.