SINGAPORE: The chief executive officer of restaurant operator No Signboard Holdings was charged on Thursday (Jul 27) with price rigging offences.
Lim Yong Sim, who is also the executive chairman of the company, is charged with three counts of engaging in a course of conduct for the purpose of creating a false appearance with respect to the price of No Signboard Holdings shares.
The 46-year-old is accused of placing orders for No Signboard Holdings shares, and trades in the shares were executed through the account of Gugong – the majority shareholder of No Signboard Holdings – to push up or support the prices.
These trades were done between Jun 19 and Jun 29, 2018, as well as between Nov 30, 2018 and Jan 11, 2019. At the time, Lim was the director and majority shareholder of Gugong, said the police.
He is also accused of placing orders for the company’s shares on Jan 31, 2019. Trades in the company’s corporate trading account were executed to push up or support the price of its shares, said the police.
Lim was arrested on Apr 30, 2019 on “reasonable suspicion” that sections of the Securities and Futures Act on false trading, market-rigging transactions and insider trading “may have been breached”, the Catalist-listed company said in a filing to the Singapore Exchange (SGX) in 2019.
The charges against Lim were filed after a joint investigation by the Commercial Affairs Department and the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
If convicted, he may be jailed for up to seven years, fined up to S$250,000 (US$189,000) or both.
According to its website, No Signboard runs three restaurants in Singapore – No Signboard Seafood in Geylang, Little Sheep Hot Pot in Orchard, and nosignboard Sheng Jian in Northpoint City.