KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 15): The Securities Commission (SC) Malaysia has charged three individuals including Supermax Corporation Bhd chief executive officer Datuk Seri Stanley Thai with insider trading offences, which is related to Supermax unit APL Industries Bhd (APLI).

In a press statement today, SC said Thai, 54, was charged at the Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court this morning with one count of communicating non-public information between Oct 26 and Oct 29, 2007 to Tiong Kiong Choon, a remisier with a stock broking company.

Thai was then the chief executive officer of APLI, a company that was delisted from Bursa Malaysia in 2009.

Notably, Tiong was earlier charged by the SC last Tuesday at the Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court for selling 6.2 million APLI shares on Oct 26 and 29, 2007 whilst in possession of the non-public information through accounts belonging to his mother-in-law and his mother.

In addition, the SC also charged Thai’s spouse Tan Bee Geok, who was the group executive director of APLI with one count of communicating non-public information to her sister, Tan Bee Hong, between Oct 23 and Oct 31, 2007.

“One charge was also preferred by the SC against Tan Bee Hong for disposing, on Oct 31 2007, 350,000 units of APLI shares held in her account while in possession of the same non-public information,” said the regulator.

Thai, Bee Geok and Bee Hong all claimed trial to the respective charges preferred. Sessions Court judge Abdul Rashid bin Daud fixed bail at RM250,000 for Thai, while bail for Tan Bee Geok and Tan Bee Hong was fixed at RM250,000 and RM150,000 respectively, it added.

The SC noted that Thai and Bee Geok have been ordered to surrender their international passports to the court on Feb 3 and Feb 4, 2015 respectively while Bee Hong’s passport was surrendered to the court today.  

The SC alleged that the non-public information referred to in all the charges related to the audit adjustments proposed by APLI’s auditors which resulted in APLI reporting a higher loss amounting to RM21.1 million for the financial year ended June 2007, as compared with the unaudited results of RM4.5 million for the same period.

The adjustments also resulted in APLI being designated as a PN 17 company, it added.

The offences carry a punishment of mandatory imprisonment not exceeding 10 years and a fine of not less than RM1 million, the SC added.

SC’s director of enforcement Ahmad Fairuz Zainol Abidin stated in the same statement that the abuse of inside information can seriously undermine market integrity and investor confidence.

In a separate press statement today, Supermax said that the charges on both Thai and Bee Geok are strictly related to transactions in APLI shares which allegedly occurred in 2007.

 “Both Dato Seri Stanley Thai and Datin Seri Cheryl Tan (Bee Geok) have fully coorperated with the Securities Commision throughout the investigations related to APLI shares,” said the company.

 The company said that its business operations are not affected and are running as usual in all Supermax offices and factories.

However, Supermax share price fell 16.5% or 32 sen to its two-year low of RM1.62 yesterday.