Former vice chairman of Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控) Jeffrey Koo Jr (辜仲諒) was yesterday sentenced to nine years in jail by the Taipei District Court for his company’s illegal purchase of a stake in Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控).
In its ruling, the court said Koo had violated the Securities Exchange Act (證券交易法) and the Banking Act (銀行法).
The court said Koo and several company executives used NT$27.5 billion (US$892 million) to buy a 9.9 percent stake in Mega Financial through a Hong Kong branch of Chinatrust in 2004, without the approval of the Chinatrust board.
That included the illegal purchase of US$390 million in loan notes, convertible into Mega shares, using money earmarked for deposits, and then locking in profits from the transaction through insider trading, it said.
The scam, known locally as the Red Fire Case after the name of the offshore company used to conduct the illegal acts, surfaced following prosecutors’ investigations into a bid by Chinatrust Financial to take over Mega Financial.
Red Fire Developments, capitalized at US$1, was set up in Hong Kong under Koo’s instruction, the ruling said.
Koo made US$30.47 million in profit from the illegal trading and did not return the profit to his company, harming the company’s interests, it said.
The court said Koo in 2006 returned US$20.9 million to a -Chinatrust branch overseas after the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) discovered the irregularity, but he still kept US$9.57 million in a Hong-Kong based front company controlled by the Koo family.
The court said Koo gave former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) family NT$290 million in -connection with Chinatrust’s failed -takeover bid of Mega Financial Holding Co from the US$9.57 million as political donations.
Former Chinatrust chief financial officer Perry Chang (張明田), chief legal adviser Deng Yan-dun (鄧彥敦) and vice general manager Lin Hsiang-hsi (林祥曦) have also been convicted in the case.
Later yesterday, Koo’s lawyer said his client would appeal the ruling.
Additional reporting by CNA
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said that it would redesign the written portion of the driver’s license exam to make it more rigorous. “We hope that the exam can assess drivers’ understanding of traffic rules, particularly those who take the driver’s license test for the first time. In the past, drivers only needed to cram a book of test questions to pass the written exam,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told a news conference at the Taoyuan Motor Vehicle Office. “In the future, they would not be able to pass the test unless they study traffic regulations
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying
‘COMING MENACINGLY’: The CDC advised wearing a mask when visiting hospitals or long-term care centers, on public transportation and in crowded indoor venues Hospital visits for COVID-19 last week increased by 113 percent to 41,402, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, as it encouraged people to wear a mask in three public settings to prevent infection. CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said weekly hospital visits for COVID-19 have been increasing for seven consecutive weeks, and 102 severe COVID-19 cases and 19 deaths were confirmed last week, both the highest weekly numbers this year. CDC physician Lee Tsung-han (李宗翰) said the youngest person hospitalized due to the disease this year was reported last week, a one-month-old baby, who does not
RSS