1 billion in alleged fraud case (Former: Fat boy screwed her of S$48 million)

[jurongkechil]

He run to other country also better right?

 

[Patriotmissile]

Poor ipoh girl can become uhnw must be either luck or fuck.

 

[LITTLEREDDOT]

‘World came crashing down’: Ex-Envy director and family invested more than $40m in nickel scam​

Ng Yu Zhi, the man accused of masterminding the alleged scam, arriving at the State Courts in January 2023.PHOTO: ST FILE

Selina Lum
Apr 02, 2025

SINGAPORE - The former executive director of the Envy companies cried on the stand on April 1 as he talked about how “the world came crashing down” on his family, who had invested more than $40 million in a nickel-trading scam.

Mr Lau Lee Sheng was testifying in the ongoing trial of 37-year-old Ng Yu Zhi, the man accused of masterminding the alleged scam, which attracted $1.46 billion from investors through his companies Envy Asset Management and Envy Global Trading.

Ng faces 108 charges over offences including cheating, forgery, criminal breach of trust, money laundering and fraudulent trading.

The prosecution is proceeding on 42 of these charges in the current trial, which began in November 2024.

Mr Lau, a former secondary schoolmate of Ng, whose companies he joined, told the court that he invested $26 million in the scam, while his father put in another $15 million to $16 million.

His mother and two sisters were also investors. The sum of $500,000 that his mother invested was a very significant amount of her life savings, he said.

As at February 2021, he was managing more than $200 million from 30 investors, at least half of whom were family members and relatives.

Mr Lau said he and his family realised “everything was a fraud” when Ng was arrested that year.

During this period, his mother felt a lump in her chest, but did not tell anyone because of the trauma that the family was going through, he said.

She was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer a year later, he said tearfully.

When Judicial Commissioner Christopher Tan asked how she was doing, Mr Lau replied that she was “going on strong”.

Mr Lau also told the court that the liquidators of the Envy companies are seeking to claw back from him more than $17 million, most of which is said to be what he earned in commissions, although he is considered a “non-complicit” employee.

If the liquidators succeed, he would be bankrupt, he said.

The nickel-trading scam attracted $1.46 billion from 947 investors over six years, and Ng allegedly used the invested funds to finance his lavish lifestyle.

Ng told investors he could buy nickel at a discount from an Australian mining company and then sell the metal for sizeable profits.

But prosecutors say no nickel was actually bought or sold; earlier investors were paid with money put in by other investors.

The scheme was offered through Envy Asset Management (EAM) from February 2016.

After EAM was placed on the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s investor alert list in March 2020, the scheme was moved to Envy Global Trading.

Mr Lau said he reconnected with Ng in 2015 through a mutual friend.

On Ng’s advice, he invested $50,000 in oil and gas company Seadrill, and received five or six times that amount in returns, he said.

Wanting to learn about investing from Ng, Mr Lau asked him for a job and joined EAM in mid-2016.

Mr Lau said he began querying Ng about the nickel scheme in the second half of 2018, after he could not answer questions about it from high-net-worth individuals who were his prospective customers.

Screenshots of the text messages exchanged between Ng and Mr Lau were shown in court.

In the messages, Mr Lau asked Ng for various documents, and Ng showed him some.

He said he felt assured by the documents, such as bank statements, and Ng’s explanations.

In March 2019, he confronted Ng after learning that the co-founder of Envy, Ms Rhiya Lee, did not have access to its bank accounts.

Later, in a text message, Ng told Mr Lau to trust him, and said he felt hurt by the confrontation.

Mr Lau said: “Today, looking back at this, he was just trying to guilt-trip me.”

The trial continues on April 2.

 

[LITTLEREDDOT]

$1.45b nickel scam: Venture capitalist says he was impressed when he first met alleged scammer​

Venture capitalist Finian Tan (left) told the High Court that he was impressed by alleged fraudster Ng Yu Zhi.PHOTOS: ONG WEE JIN, LIANHE ZAOBAO

Selina Lum
Apr 03, 2025

SINGAPORE - Well-known venture capitalist Finian Tan told the High Court on April 3 that he was impressed by alleged fraudster Ng Yu Zhi, who was introduced to him as a successful nickel trader when they first met in August 2020.

Dr Tan said: “I was so amazed that such a young person could have amassed so much net worth.”

“He was a self-made man apparently, and he was so young. He appeared knowledgeable and smart... He understood what I was doing, asked very good questions, didn’t inherit his wealth.”

Dr Tan, the founder and chairman of Vickers Venture Partners, is known for spotting the potential in search giant Baidu back in 2000, when it was just a small Chinese start-up.

He was taking the stand in the ongoing trial of Ng, 37, who is accused of masterminding a nickel-trading scam that attracted $1.45 billion from hundreds of investors over six years.

Ng is accused of cheating Dr Tan into delivering US$19.2 million (S$25.6 million) in fresh funds to Ng’s company, Envy Global Trading (EGT).

Ng allegedly did this by making Dr Tan believe that the company was buying nickel at a discount and selling the metal for a profit.

Taking the stand on the afternoon of April 3, Dr Tan noted that Ng never approached him about the nickel business.

He said a good friend had told him about someone who was keen to invest in Vickers or one of its funds.

Dr Tan, who holds a PhD in engineering, said he agreed to meet this person.

The meeting, held on Dr Tan’s boat in Sentosa, was attended by Ng and Ms Veronica Shim.

Ms Shim, a former Singapore Airlines flight attendant-turned-private banker, was then chief executive of fund manager Envysion Wealth Management.

Dr Tan said Ms Shim, who arrived earlier, told him that Ng was a “very, very successful nickel trader”.

He added that he believed Ng must be successful because he was intending to put millions into investments with a long horizon.

After this meeting, Ng agreed to commit a US$5 million investment in one of the funds.

Subsequently, Ng expressed interest in investing US$24 million in one of the companies in the Vickers group but had three conditions.

Ng wanted to bring others in on the investment, wanted the investment to be paid in two tranches, and wanted Dr Tan to be on Envysion’s board of advisers.

After meeting the six others, who include Envy co-founder Rhiya Lee and sales director Lau Lee Sheng, Dr Tan agreed to the conditions.

Out of the US$24 million invested, Ng contributed US$13 million.

Dr Tan said he agreed to be Envysion’s adviser because the time commitment was small, and he was happy to advise young companies on venture capitalism.

After agreeing to be an adviser to Envysion, he met Ms Shim at Centennial Tower, where EGT’s office is located.

It was then that he found out Envysion’s “bread and butter” was investing in Ng’s nickel business.

He said: “I was quite surprised because nickel trading is volatile. How do you raise a fund that invests in nickel trading?”

He said when he asked Ms Shim how Ng could make so much money, she told him to speak to Ng.

“This was the first time after the first two business deals that I found out what Youzhi did,” he said, referring to Ng by his name in Mandarin.

Dr Tan, who used to be an oil trader, said he had never made such consistent money in trading and wanted to know how Ng did it.

Ng told Dr Tan that at his former job at an accounting firm, one of his clients was a nickel miner.

At the time, the demand for nickel was low, but there was a surplus of the metal.

Ng said he bought nickel at a discount and sold it for a profit.

Over time, the supplier had enough confidence in him to grant him a term contract.

Subsequently, the demand for nickel surged, and it became a seller’s market.

Dr Tan said he related this to his own experience trading in the Middle East, and the rate of returns sounded very realistic to him.

When Dr Tan returned home, he checked the nickel prices for the past years, and they were consistent with Ng’s narrative.

He later asked Ng in a text message if he could invest in his nickel business.

Dr Tan’s testimony continues on April 4.

Ng faces 108 charges over offences including cheating, forgery, criminal breach of trust, money laundering and fraudulent trading.

The prosecution is proceeding on 42 of these charges in the current trial, which began in November 2024.

​

 

[LITTLEREDDOT]

‘I was sold’: Venture capitalist admits he was fooled by alleged fraudster in $1.45b nickel scam​

5 Apr 2025
Selina Lum

Well-known venture capitalist Finian Tan told the court that he had always avoided being cheated, but was “sold” on the story that alleged fraudster Ng Yu Zhi had told him for several months.
Well-known venture capitalist Finian Tan told the High Court on April 4 that he had always avoided being cheated, but was “sold” on the story that alleged fraudster Ng Yu Zhi had told him for several months.

When the Commercial Affairs Department started looking into Ng’s nickel-trading business, Dr Tan was thinking of ways to help Ng solve his problem with the authorities, believing that it was just a misunderstanding.

Dr Tan said he then tried, but could not get satisfactory answers from Ng. After gathering information from other sources, he realised it was more than a misunderstanding. “There was a serious stench of some fraud,” he said.

Dr Tan, the founder and chairman of Vickers Venture Partners, was on the stand for the second day in the ongoing trial of Ng, 37, who is accused of masterminding a nickel-trading scam that attracted $1.45 billion from hundreds of investors from 2016 to 2021.

Ng is accused of cheating Dr Tan by getting him to deliver US$19.2 million (S$25.7 million) between October 2020 and January 2021 to Ng’s company Envy Global Trading (EGT).

He allegedly did so by deceiving Dr Tan into believing that the company was buying nickel at a discount and selling the metal for a profit.

The bulk of the sum came from Dr Tan: US$14 million was from holding company Vickers Financial Group, of which he is the majority shareholder, and another US$1.5 million was his personal money.

Ng is also accused of cheating a company named FinComm, which used money from two of Vickers’ funds to invest in the nickel scheme. FinComm had delivered another US$14.1 million to EGT between December 2020 and January 2021.

The prosecution contends that no nickel was actually bought or sold; earlier investors were paid with money put in by other investors.

During his first day on the stand, Dr Tan said he was introduced to Ng in August 2020. He said Ng did not approach him about the nickel business, but wanted to invest in Vickers.

Dr Tan later asked Ng how he made his money in nickel trading, and asked to invest in Ng’s business.

On April 4, when asked how the case had affected him, Dr Tan said: “As a venture capitalist, it’s my first exposure to something like this.”

Speaking thoughtfully, he noted that he was in the business of investing and taking risks, and that several people had tried to cheat him. “I’ve always avoided them because I could see slip-ups,” he said.

“I admit that in this case, I was sold. He was skilful in what he did. He could fool me,” said Dr Tan.

He said Ng knew all the jargon and knew what could possibly make this type of money. He noted that Ng chose a metal that had low prices a few years ago, but whose prices have since gone up.

Dr Tan also testified about the “amazing act” that Ng had put on. The two men often met for meals with their families, and Ng was always checking nickel prices on his phone, said Dr Tan.

Once, Ng was constantly checking about a hurricane in Australia, apparently out of concern over a cargo loading. They high-fived each other after the loading was done, he testified.

“I never expected that this would be a Ponzi (scheme),” he said. “Why would someone doing (a) Ponzi (scheme) lock up money for 12 years?”

He was referring to how Ng had agreed to commit a US$5 million investment in one of Vickers’ funds.

Ng had also contributed US$13 million out of a US$24 million investment that he and six others had put into a company in the Vickers group.

Dr Tan said Ng had gained his trust. “He invested in us with no requirement. He never solicited anything, he never asked me to invest... I treated him as an investor,” he said.

Dr Tan said the nickel scheme seemed to make sense at the time, given his own experience in commodity trading.

Ng claimed he had a term contract to buy nickel from the supplier at a discount. He needed funds to buy the nickel and ship the cargo to the buyer, said Dr Tan.

Dr Tan said he understood that it was difficult for Ng to borrow money from banks because he was running a “small shop”.

He added that he consulted metals traders and also got good feedback from other investors, including people he knew personally.

Dr Tan said he now realised that many people had invested their life savings and that lives have been destroyed.

He said he still could not connect the person he knew to what Ng has been accused of.

“What would motivate someone to do this and hurt so many people in the process?”

 

[CoffeeAhSoh]

 

[Narong Wongwan]

This case also show how that bi Finian Tan to be a fool. And those high flyers all no critical thinking. You worry with these gullible people in charge

 

[CoffeeAhSoh]

They said Money Talks . How true deh woh

 

[NanoSpeed]

Finian Tan is @sbfuncle ?

Finian looks like John Lone.

 

[sbfuncle]

Finian Tan is @sbfuncle ?

Finian looks like John Lone.

Indeed finian look like me now except I'm a little more kcb

 

[NanoSpeed]

Indeed finian look like me now except I'm a little more kcb

 

[jsctan]

This type white collar crime must jail life sentence so cannot come out enjoy the hard earned money of his victims.

 

[CoffeeAhSoh]

Will he breaks Chia Teck Leng 's record of 42 years ? :(