HONG KONG, CHINA / ACCESSWIRE / August 13, 2018 / Takung Art Co., Ltd. (NYSE American: TKAT), the operator of three online fine art and collectibles platforms, today announced it is suspending new listings of art and other products on its unit trading platform until the end of October 2018. In recent weeks, Takung has experienced market weakness on the unit trading platform including a decrease in trading volume and customer deposits. Customer deposits have historically been a leading indicator of cash available for investments in new offerings.

Management expects Takung will continue to generate revenue from trading commissions from the platform's existing listings and the company's e-commerce platform, Takung Online. However, new artwork listings on the unit trading platform have been the key revenue driver for Takung, and the suspension will have a significant negative impact on the company's revenue and net income in the third quarter, and possibly beyond.

Takung CEO Mr. Di Xiao commented, "The weakness on our trading platform is attributable primarily to the overall bearish investment sentiment in China, which has temporarily affected our traders' appetite for new art investments. In the next few months, as we go through this challenging period, we will concentrate our efforts on maintaining a healthy and stable secondary trading market for the existing portfolios on the trading platform; at the same time, we are exploring ways to expand the content and reach of our e-commerce platform."

Mr. Xiao noted that in addition to year-to-date declines of 15.5% and 20.2% in the composite indexes of the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges, respectively, a recent wave of peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platform defaults in China have had a material effect on investor sentiment.

Takung Online, the company's e-commerce platform, has recently begun to generate revenue in China. Since its soft launch in November last year, the platform has attracted over 13,000 registered users, over 800 up-and-coming artists, and more than 5,000 artworks listings. Further, a market analysis prepared by Takung on the feasibility of launching an e-commerce platform in the United States has shown that a market does exist in the U.S. for the artwork of contemporary Chinese artists who currently sell their pieces through Takung and art dealers in China.

"While we hope this market downturn and temporary loss of listing revenue will be short-lived," said Mr. Xiao, "we understand the need to prepare and make certain adjustments in order to continue as a strong participant in the Chinese art market longer-term. We have started an internal restructuring process to increase operational efficiencies and cut costs, and we expect to decrease G&A expenses by approximately 10% in the third quarter. At the same time, we believe Takung Online will continue to grow and, hopefully, help to offset some of the revenue lost from the absence of new listings on the unit platform. Lastly, we believe we are fortunate to be in a strong cash position to get through this challenging period."