Page 56 - TreasuryChinaTrust

Treasury China Trust Annual Report 2010 41

CORPORATE GOVERNANCE REPORT

COMMUNICATIONS WITH UNITHOLDERS

COCG Code Principle 14: The Trustee-Manager should engage in regular, effective and fair communication with Unitholders.

As part of the continuing obligations of the Trustee-Manager under the Listing Manual of the SGX-ST, the Board’s policy is that all Unitholders be informed in a timely manner of all major developments that affect TCT. All announcements made on behalf of TCT are available on TCT’s website (www.treasurychinatrust.com).

The Trustee-Manager is committed to a strong culture of continuous disclosure and transparent communication with the investing community, in particular with its Unitholders. Quarterly results with detailed financial information are publicly available on the websites of TCT and the SGX-ST. TCT’s website also contains disclosed financial information, annual reports, investor presentations, analyst coverage, distribution notices, news releases and other material developments announced through the SGX-ST website.

Investor relations is handled by management who meet with analysts, institutional investors and fund managers regularly to promote TCT, communicate its business performance and developments and gather views and feedback. Management has also participated in conferences locally and overseas. In accordance with the Trustee-Manager’s objective of transparent communication, briefing materials are released to the SGX-ST and made available on the TCT’s website.

COCG Code Principle 15: The Trustee-Manager should encourage greater unitholder participation at AGMs of the Trust and allow unitholders the opportunity to communicate their views on various matters affecting the Trust.

All Unitholders of TCT will receive a copy of the Annual Report and Notice of the Annual General Meeting of the Unitholders annually. Notice of the Annual General Meeting of the Unitholders will also be advertised in the newspapers and will be made available on the SGX-ST website.

Unitholders will have the opportunity to address their queries to the Board at the Annual General Meeting (“AGM”). The external auditors have also been invited to attend the AGM and assist the Directors in addressing queries from Unitholders relating to the conduct of the audit and the preparation and content of the audited financial statements of TCT.

In accordance with the TCT Trust Deed, a Unitholder of TCT is allowed to appoint one or two proxies to attend and vote at any meeting of Unitholders on his behalf through proxy forms sent in advance.

The Company Secretary prepares minutes of Unitholders’ meetings, which incorporate substantial comments or queries from Unitholders and responses from the Board and Management. These minutes are available to Unitholders upon their request in writing.

In preparation for the Annual General Meeting, Unitholders are encouraged to refer to the SGX-ST’s investor guides, namely “An Investor’s Guide To Reading Annual Reports” and “An Investor’s Guide to Preparing For Annual General Meetings”. The guides, in both English and Chinese versions, are available at the SGX-ST website via the link below:

http://www.sgx.com/wps/portal/marketplace/mp-en/investor_centre/investor_guide

OTHER MATTERS OF CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Dealing in Units

In accordance with Rule 1207 (18) of the SGX-ST Listing Manual, the Board of the Trustee-Manager has adopted a policy and procedure for dealing in the Units of TCT. The procedure requires directors of the Trustee-Manager to seek prior written consent before trading in the Units of TCT. If provided with consent to deal, directors are reminded of their duties to notify the details of the trade to the Trustee-Manager so that an appropriate announcement can be made to the SGX-ST within two business days of the trade. Copies of such announcements can be found on the TCT website. Details of the Director unitholdings can be found on pages 44 to 46 of the Annual Report.

In addition, the Property Manager has its own internal policy and procedure to ensure that staff request prior written consent before dealing in the Units of TCT. In addition, directors of the Trustee-Manager and staff of the Property Manager are reminded of the prohibited period to trade prior to the release of the Trust’s results announcement. The prohibited period is one month prior to the announcement of the annual results and two weeks prior to the announcement of the quarterly results. This policy forms part of the procedures manual reviewed by the Audit Committee as part of their internal controls overview.

Both procedures ensure that there are no Director or staff dealings during a prohibited period and that Directors and staff are reminded of laws governing insider trading.