A DIRECTOR has been sentenced to eight weeks' jail and a S$30,000 fine on Friday for rigging the market for Gaylin Holdings (now Amos Group) as he tried to save his reputation from being tarnished by the flagging price of the counter he had recommended to investors.

Wong Leon Keat had bought shares in the mainboard-listed oil and gas player on 17 occasions between November 2015 and October 2016, after its share price had been on a downward trajectory - declining from S$0.60 in 2014 to slightly above S$0.15 in 2016.

He had pleaded guilty in mid-February to seven charges of market manipulation and one count of using an investor's securities account to trade. Another 11 similar offences were taken into consideration when the district judge sentenced him on Friday.

The court said his acts had a market impact and had crossed the custodial threshold, despite the 46-year-old's lawyer Lee Teck Leng arguing for only a high fine of S$160,000.

"In my view, the artificial demand generated by the accused distorted the true forces of supply and demand which caused Gaylin's share price to close higher but for the accused's actions..." District Judge Toh Han Li said.

"The misleading appearance was the signal to potential investors that the price of Gaylin was higher than it should have been and had the potential to mislead them on the true market value of Gaylin shares," added Judge Toh.

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The prosecution has sought for an imprisonment of 16 weeks to 20 weeks as well as a fine of S$40,000.

Mr Lee said Wong would be appealing against the imprisonment, and he is out on bail pending the hearing in the High Court.

Wong was a director of investment holding company Rhodus Capital and also a director of corporate advisory services firm WLA Regnum, but he had recommended Gaylin shares to investors in his personal capacity.

He was also the managing director and chief corporate officer of Catalist-listed air-conditioning company Natural Cool, but he stepped down in January last year, shortly before he was charged with these offences.

He had purchased 100 shares to 200 shares each time in the highly illiquid Gaylin counter at the best ask price during trading hours and also placed buy orders to raise the closing price during the six-minute closing routine after trading stopped for the day.

This caused the counter to trade at 6.5 per cent to 38.6 per cent higher at the closing bell.

Amos closed flat at 1.7 Singapore cents at Friday's midday break.