So be honest, who had an AIM-quoted micro-cap Indian port operator on their list of Trump 2025 trades? …
No, me neither.
Nevertheless, Mercantile Ports and Logistics Ltd (LSE:MPL) - a company developing a new port south of Mumbai Harbour - soared over 40% in Thursday’s trade after it hired President Trump’s former ethics counsel and campaign supporter.
The Washington DC lobbyist, Stefan Passantino, joins the MPL board as a non-executive director.
“I am excited to see how Stefan's experiences and contacts can help MPL to create value for shareholders,” chair Jeremy Warner Allen said in a stock market statement.
Passantino served in Trump’s administration during his first term as president as deputy counsel, for ethics, and he later formed Elections LLC supporting the 2020 campaign, then in 2023, he was hired by the Trump Organization.
The lobbyist’s other political connections include senior Republican Newt Gingrich, former Republican senator Kelly Loeffler, Republican senator Ted Cruz, Trump’s former Energy Secretary Rick Perry, and the Republican National Lawyers Association.
MPL highlighted to investors on Thursday that its project’s strategic position has attracted interest from parties in the US, who see investment and commercial opportunities, particularly since Trump inauguration in January.
The company also noted in its statement on Thursday that revenue for 2024 was expected to amount to £4.6 million (roughly the same as its current market capitalisation on AIM), and that it soon hopes to announce a resolution it is debt situation.
It described protracted negotiations with its existing lenders over a potential refinancing as a “source of frustration”. The company noted that it has been it talks for many months to renegotiate its loan facility, and it has had a negative impact on its ability to secure longer term contracts with customers.
Locally, meanwhile, the company said that a previously reported “pause” on contracts connected to infrastructure project amid an election in Maharashtra State, has now passed and activity had “begun to flow again”.
“The levels of enquiry to use the Facility are at record levels and the Company is confident that, following completion of the banking solution, the company will return to the levels of growth that the board had forecast,” MPL added.
In London, the shares were up around 30% at 1.26p each – though in earlier trade they changed hands up to 1.49p.