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Ma says sorry for missing wife's share sales

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday apologized for failing to publicly acknowledge that his wife Chow Mei-ching (周美青) had sold shares in 2004 and 2005, while denying that the transaction constituted insider trading.

In response to his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential rival Frank Hsieh's (謝長廷) pledge last Saturday that he or his family would not invest in the stock market if he is elected president, Ma said in a written statement later that same day that he and his family possessed stocks, but had never sold them.

However, Ma's camp issued another news release late on Thursday night reversing its previous statement and saying that Chow, an employee of Mega Financial Holdings (兆豐金控), did sell some of the shares given by the company on "several occasions."

"I apologize for failing to explain clearly immediately. I did not intend to hide the news. She does not own a lot of stocks, and the shares were given by her company," Ma said during a visit to Taichung.

Ma said he did not understand Mega Holdings' regulations on company stock trading and failed to check his wife's trading record thoroughly.

"We will look into the matter thoroughly from now on," he said, adding that both he and his wife were not involved in any insider trading.

Ma had said on Jan. 18 that he would not prohibit his family members from buying and selling stocks if elected president, as long as no insider trading was involved.

His spokesman, Luo Chih-chiang (羅智強), said Chow only has shares of Mega Holdings and sold 90,000 shares in 2004 and 60,000 shares in 2005 to reduce her shareholding.

Chow still owns more than 50,000 shares of the company's stock, Luo said.

Ma, on the other hand, purchased 3,000 shares of China Steel Corporation (中鋼) in 1989 and 6,000 shares of Fubon Financial (富邦金控) in 1999, but has never sold the stocks, Luo said.

Luo called on Hsieh to make public his and his family members' stock trading record, adding that Ma would only respond to questions on economic issues and public policies from now.
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