Maxbiz CEO: “RM 50 million is nothing to shout about” (2)

I wrote before about this subject. Two of the many red flags I mentioned:


[2] Maxbiz and five directors received public reprimands and fines:

• MAXBIZ had breached paragraph 9.16(1)(a) of the LR for failing to ensure that the 4th quarterly report for the financial year ended 31 December 2008 ("4th QR 2008") which was announced on 2 March 2009 took into account the adjustments as stated in the Company’s announcement dated 4 May 2009.
• MAXBIZ had reported an unaudited loss after taxation and minority interest of RM6.227 million for the financial year ended 31 December 2008. However, the Company had on 30 April 2009 reported an audited loss after taxation and minority interest of RM76.926 million.
• Bursa Securities also found that the directors of MAXBIZ to be in breach of paragraph 16.11(b) of the LR for permitting knowingly or where they had reasonable means of obtaining such knowledge the Company to commit the above breach.

[4] Directors own not even a single share:

The Securities Commission has now charged one of the above directors, this time for (allegedly) insider trading.


Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) today charged Dato’ Vincent Leong Jee Wai (Dato’ Vincent Leong) for insider trading of shares of Maxbiz Corporation Berhad (Maxbiz).

Dato’ Vincent Leong, 58, was charged at the Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court this morning with two counts of communicating material non-public information between November 2010 and January 2011 to one Leong Wye Keong when he should have known that Leong Wye Keong would tend to dispose shares of Maxbiz Corporation Berhad (Maxbiz). Dato’ Vincent Leong was at the material time the Managing Director of Maxbiz.

The material non-public information for the first charge relates to the decrease in Maxbiz’s shareholders’ equity which was close to Maxbiz being classified as financially distressed. The second charge concerns the classification of Maxbiz as a Practice Note 17 (PN17) company.

Dato’ Vincent Leong claimed trial to both charges. Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court Judge, Puan Azian binti Othman fixed bail at RM250,000 with one surety.  Dato’ Vincent Leong was also ordered to surrender his passport to the court.

Insider trading is punishable under section 188(4) of the CMSA, with an imprisonment term not exceeding 10 years and a fine of not less than RM1 million.


A certain "Leong Wye Keong" is mentioned in this court case (most likely as an aggrieved investor in a fund managed by SJ Asset Management). I am not sure if it is the same person, but it could very well be so, the name is not very common. The court case is against SJ Asset Management (and other parties).

I wrote before:


A strange coincedence is the fact that SJ Asset Management was the 2nd largest shareholder of Maxbiz, an asset management company being examined closely by the Securities Commission (SC) due to irregularities in its accounts.


It is a small world, isn't it?

The Securities Commission is quite active in enforcement regarding insider trading these days. Unfortunately, the cases seem all rather old, the alleged events often took place 6-8 years ago. Does it really need to take such a long time before somebody can be charged?