Dealer says 'John' and 'Su Ling' placed unauthorised trades in penny stocks

Singapore

ANOTHER prosecution witness in the trial of John Soh Chee Wen and Quah Su-Ling, who allegedly rigged the market for Blumont Group, Asiasons Capital (now Attilan Group) and LionGold Corp, testified that he had accepted trades from unauthorised persons for his clients' accounts.

Dealer Chew Keng Chiow Alex testified that he took orders from a "John" and a "Su Ling" for eight trading accounts belonging to four other individuals at DMG & Partners Securities (now RHB Securities Singapore) from October 2011 till Oct 11, 2013.

Mr Chew on Tuesday did not identify who "John" and "Su Ling" were, and he took orders from the pair mainly by Blackberry messages.

He noted that there were verbal instructions either directly or indirectly from the account-holders - Annica Holdings' then-executive director Edwin Sugiarto, James Hong Gee Ho, Goh Hin Calm and the latter's wife - to let John and Su Ling trade using their accounts, and that Su Ling would settle any trading losses.

Currently, Goh is serving a three-year jail term for abetting Soh and Quah in their alleged conspiracy.

No consent was obtained by these account-holders from DMG to allow trading orders placed by John or Su Ling on their behalf, said Mr Chew.

Su Ling started giving Mr Chew trading orders, mainly in Asiasons and LionGold, and she occasionally dabbled in others including PSL Holdings, Chaswood Resources Holdings, Swee Hong and Innopac Holdings. John came into the picture later, and his trades were focused on Blumont with the earliest trade in the counter on Dec 27, 2012 but there was trading in Asiasons and LionGold shares at times, the court heard.

Mr Chew said he could use any of the eight accounts when none was specified, except Mr Hong's when trading in Blumont shares as Mr Hong, being Blumont's then-executive director, would have to declare the trades.

Mr Chew would report the trades to John and Su Ling, as well as informing them who his covering colleague was when he went on leave.

After prices of Blumont, Asiasons and LionGold - collectively known as BAL - crashed in early October 2013, he contacted Su Ling to get her settle the trading losses of S$387,951 but to no avail, and they were made good by Mr Hong in the end.

Mr Chew said he had lied in his earlier police statements after he read in the news that John Soh could be responsible for the BAL stock's performance. As he had been taking instructions from "John", he did not want to get himself implicated.

But he decided to "come clean" after he prayed about his fears, Mr Chew said as he teared up. He would be cross-examined on Wednesday.

Earlier, former OCBC Securities remisier Ng Kit Kiat was accused by the defence of falsely implicating Soh and Quah by telling the authorities what they wanted to hear so that he could "divert attention" away from his "market misconduct", including taking an order from a client but lodging his own trade before the client's order was placed. Mr Ng denied it.