Incite shares suspended after 40% plunge

Incite Holdings, which provides content on mobile phones and which counts the England rugby captain Lawrence Dallaglio among its staff, called for its shares to be suspended yesterday after they collapsed by nearly 40 per cent.

The stock had registered heavy falls during the day as fears mounted that the company would fail to publish its annual financial results, and rumours circulated that it was running out of cash.

Under stock exchange rules, companies listed on the Alternative Investment Market must publish their annual accounts within six months of their financial year-end.

Incite, which floated on AIM last September, recently changed its year-end to 31 October from 31 July but was still required to file its 12-month figures by the end of January.

Incite had until 8am on Monday to publish the information before the authorities would have considered suspending the shares. But, in a statement released after the stock market had closed last night - with its shares having fallen 16p, or 36.8 per cent, to 27.5p - Incite asked AIM to suspend trading in its shares, saying it was in discussions which could lead to it buying "substantial mobile media assets". It also said it was undertaking a fundraising in connection with that deal.

"In the light of these developments, the company considers it would be inappropriate to release its preliminary results as required by the AIM rules by the end of January until full details are available," it said. The company said it had asked for trading in its shares to be suspended until it was in a position to publish further information about those matters.

Shares in Incite were floated at 25p a share but rose to hit a high of 75.5p in October. Richard Griffiths, the chairman of Evolution Beeson Gregory, had a stake of 8.2 per cent in the business but has since sold out.