Catalist-listed Koyo International 5OC has announced that its executive director, Foo Suay Lun, has entered into a loan agreement with the group&rsquo s wholly-owned subsidiary, Koyo Engineering   (S.E. Asia) Pte Ltd. 

 

According to the loan agreement, dated Sept 12, Foo has agreed to extend an interest-bearing capital loan of up to $3 million to the subsidiary. 

 

The loan repayment is set to be repaid in full after a one-year period from Sept 12.

 

In a Sept 12 bourse filing, the group states that interest is chargeable at 1.5% per annum above the cost of funds of an existing commercial bank, in line with the commercial bank&rsquo s letter of offer to the subsidiary. 

 

The current interest rate for the loan as at Sept 12 is 5.20%. 

 

Foo, the brother of Foo Suay Wei, managing director and CEO of Koyo International, owns 100% of Salix Capital Pte Ltd. He currently holds 49,449,500 ordinary shares representing 26.05% of the Koyo International&rsquo s issued and paid up share capital as of Sept 12. 

 

The mastermind behind the share price manipulation of Catalist-listed Koyo International 5OC 0.00% , Andrew Lin Eng Jue, has been sentenced to 42 months&rsquo imprisonment by district judge Chay Yuen Fatt at the State Courts.

 

Over a 17-month period between 2014 and 2016, Lin was accused of leading a scheme to manipulate the price of Koyo shares from a low of 16 cents Aug 12, 2014 to a high of 40 cents in January 2016.

 

The scheme involved the buying and selling of Koyo shares via a total of 53 trading accounts under the names of 15 individuals across eight brokerages.

 

When the scheme unravelled, Koyo share price crashed by almost 84%, closing at 5.6 cents on Jan 18, 2016 while the market capitalisation had dropped by an excess of $58 million.

 

According to prosecutors, Lin has also displayed a lack of remorse throughout proceedings. On top of being uncooperative, Lin provided &ldquo contrived and incredulous&rdquo responses to the Monetary Authority of Singapore during investigations &mdash only pleading guilty in the face of overwhelming evidence.

A FORMER CGS-CIMB Securities employee will do jail time for her involvement in manipulating trading in the shares of Catalist-listed Koyo International between August 2014 and January 2016.

 

Lau Wan Heng, 62, was sentenced to 20 months' imprisonment for one count of engaging in a course of conduct which she knew would be likely to create a false or misleading impression of active trading in the shares under Section 197(1A)(a) of the Securities and Futures Act (SFA).

 

She was also found guilty on 12 counts of unauthorised trading under section 201(b) of the SFA, for which she was handed another 18 weeks' jail. Some of these sentences will run consecutively, and others, concurrently.

 

Another 19 charges were taken into consideration in the sentencing.

 

Lau, who begins her sentence on Oct 29, was initially a broker and later a remisier at the brokerage firm.

 

She was part of an alleged multi-member scheme that was said to have artificially pushed up the share price of Koyo, a provider of integrated mechanical and electrical engineering services, during the period.

 

Alleged mastermind Lin Eng Jue, 43, was introduced to Lau by the Koyo chief executive in January 2015, when he then asked for Lau' s assistance in the scheme.

 

Between February 2015 and October the same year, Lau approached nine of her clients at CGS-CIMB, and convinced them to allow her to use their trading accounts to trade Koyo shares. She then performed trades from February till January the following year.

 

She also convinced her brother and his wife to hand over three of their trading accounts for the same purpose, though her brother executed the trades directly.

 

Those who provided their trading accounts were promised a commission of 10 per cent from profits made through their accounts. They were told that any losses incurred would be paid by the scheme members.

 

In the final phase of the scheme between October 2015 and January 2016, Lau obtained more trading accounts to be used, after earlier informing her clients that she was considering leaving CGS-CIMB to join either RHB or KGI Securities. This came after she realised that CGS-CIMB was restricting her credit limits.

 

She then told her clients - with the exception of her brother - that she was leaving due to " work issues" .

 

As a result, her CGS-CIMB clients opened or re-activated a total of 17 RHB and KGI trading accounts. She sought help from two other employees at these firms to carry out the trades. Her brother also handed over to her two more accounts he opened in his name.

 

Lau did not leave CGS-CIMB.

 

Overall, she contributed to 31 of the total 53 trading accounts used in the scheme.

 

Following legal action taken against her by CGS-CIMB, she paid some S$231,000 to the firm, on account of their losses made following the crash in Koyo share price in January 2016.

 

Lau is the fourth person in the scheme to be sentenced. Lin and three others have been charged, and their cases are ongoing.