I've speculated before about whether they're using their united shares as security for loans in their shopping mall business. They apparently mortgaged that up to the hilt just before the 2008 crash, so loan-to-value % would've been high.
If the pattern here was repeated in the USA , then the lenders would have asked either for loans to be reduced or additional security. Those shares would be the obvious source and I don't believe the timing of their IPO in 2010 was coincidental.
There's now another squeeze on commercial property, plus the future for low-end malls like theirs isn't great. As the share price dropped last year, if my theory is correct, they may have been under pressure from lenders.
The sale process increased the share price significantly but it's now been 9 months since they started that and there's been no conclusion.
When we announced in 2006 that we were in talks about investment (which wasn't true, as we had no potential buyer at that time) it still took us just 6 months to complete the sale and I don't think Thaksin appeared until the April, 4 months after the December announcement. So it took around 2-3 months to complete the process with him, and we were also a quoted company.
In summary I reckon if they genuinely wanted a sale, they'd have sorted it by now. Others have speculated that they're trying to keep the share price high by dragging out the process.
It's probably a wild hope but it would be fantastic if the NYSE investigated them for market manipulation.