Update on 4 alleged fraud cases

[1] Silver Bird announced its results, sales is falling of a cliff, it can hardly book a gross profit. The only positive thing I noticed is that its Loss After Tax can be remembered easily: RM 11,111.


[2] Xian Leng announced its results, its operations have fallen to a pathetic level, I don't think it would even have been allowed on the ACE market with those tiny sales, RM 5M for the half year resulting in a loss of RM 1.5M.


[3] Genneva Malayisa; The Star wrote: "Six Genneva personnel slapped with over 900 money laundering charges".

"Six personnel from gold investment company Genneva Malaysia Sdn Bhd and another company have been slapped with 926 charges of money laundering, making false statements and illegal deposit-taking involving RM5.5bil.

Genneva received the RM5.5bil from 35,000 depositors.

Its directors Datuk Philip Lim Jit Meng and Datuk Tan Liang Keat faced 246 and 226 counts of money laundering respectively; business advisers Datuk Ng Poh Weng (155), Datuk Marcus Yee Yuean Seng (17), Datuk Chin Wai Leong (23), and general manager Lim Kah Heng (16)."


The size of the amount (RM 5,500,000,000.00) the number of key people involved (six directors/managers and 35,000 depositors) and the charges (926) are simply breath taking. Why did it have to come so far, should the regulators not have ended this scheme a long time ago?

From Genneva's website: "Preserving Values, Leaving a Legacy".

Values are definitely not preserved (more like the opposite), but the company will definitely leave a legacy, although "somewhat" different from what its clients envisioned.


[4] SJ Asset Management; No recent news regarding SJ Asset Management or its manager Tan Whai Oon.

According to this website, Tan Whai Oon (on the left in the picture) looks like this these days:

He seems quite happy, probably more happy than his previous clients.

According to this article from The Star:

"Tan, also known as Jigme Phende, has been on the run since the end of June 2010 after his fund management company had run into trouble, the result of Tan being investigated initially by the Securities Commission (SC) for charging his clients high commissions.

The managing director and 70% shareholder of SJAM is rumoured to have gone into hiding in Nepal, and his last location was tracked to a monastery called Gyalwang Drukpa in Kathmandu, the country's capital."

Is there a extradition treaty between Nepal and Malaysia?

More shocking from the same article:

".... a senior finance executive of the company spilled the beans on the accounts that have apparently been cooked since 2001."

Why did it take almost 10 years before action was taken against the asset management company?

A simple search for "LinkedIn" and "SJ Asset Management Sdn Bhd" reveals many people who worked with this asset management company. Did nobody notice anything wrong? That is hard to believe. Could they not have dropped a hint at the Securities Commission, if needed anonymously?

Here is a link to a court case between CIMB Investment Bank (whose clients had invested in the SJAM managed fund) and Ernst & Young (the accounting firm who performed the audits on the accounts of SJAM). The document shows (paragraph 8) that CIMB compensated its clients, good for the clients, but not good for the shareholders of CIMB who have to fork the bill.


Enforcement is rare and slow in Malaysia, and if VIPs are involved (like in some of the above, directly or indirectly), things often seem to come to a complete stop. Hopefully we will soon get some much needed justice and transparency in the above cases. Not only against the perpetrators, but also to other people who have been sleeping on the job, like auditors, advisors, etc.