End of road for Singapore's Hin Leong as court grants winding up order

IT's the end of passage for collapsed oil trader Hin Leong Trading (HLT) after the Singapore High Court on Monday granted an order to wind up the debt-roiled firm that was brought to its knees by last year's oil slump amid the spectre of fraud allegations.

This follows an over two-hour long hearing via Zoom before High Court Justice Kannan Ramesh on an application filed last month by HLT's judicial managers (JM) to wind up what was once an iconic oil empire founded by Singapore tycoon Lim Oon Kuin after a hunt over several months for potential investors to save the group failed.

The firm's JMs - Goh Thien Phong and Chan Kheng Tek of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) - also got their wish to be appointed as HLT's joint liquidators. Following that, the JM order was discharged.