(Yicai) March 13 -- Shares of Nordic Paper Holding surged after Shanying International Holdings, a leading Chinese paper packaging material supplier, said it plans to sell its Swedish-listed subsidiary to optimize its own resource allocation.

Nordic Paper [STO: NPAPER] closed 12.3 percent up at SEK49 (USD4.79) in Stockholm yesterday.

Shanying intends to sell all or some of the 48.2 percent stake it indirectly holds in Nordic Paper, the Shanghai-based company announced yesterday. The sale, which is still in the preliminary stage, remains uncertain as there are no buyers or offer prices yet, it added.

Shanying purchased 100 percent of Nordic Paper for SEK2.4 billion (USD234.5 million) in October 2017 to enter the high-end specialty paper market segment and enhance its overseas market business layout. The company promoted the listing of Nordic Paper on the Stockholm Nasdaq OMX Exchange three years later, cutting its holdings in the Swedish firm by more than half.

Nordic Paper has five paper mills in Sweden, Norway, and Canada, with a combined production capacity of 500,000 tons of premium specialty pulp paper, Shanying noted in yesterday’s statement. Nordic Paper’s natural greaseproof paper and kraft paper products are mainly sold in high-end markets in Europe and North America, with some also being exported to East Asia and Australia.

Nordic Paper’s unaudited operating revenue and net profit reached SEK4.5 billion and SEK416 million (USD40.64 million), respectively, last year, Shanying added.

Shanying announced at the end of January that it expected to have achieved a net profit of between CNY95 million and CNY143 million (USD13.2 million and USD19.9 million) last year, compared with a net loss of CNY2.3 billion (USD310 million) the previous year.

Shares of Shanying [SHA: 600567] were trading up 0.5 percent at CNY1.85 (26 US cents) as of 1.45 p.m. in Shanghai today.

Editor: Futura Costaglione