CEO of luxury car distributor Eurosports Global fined for false share trading

He knew this was likely to create a false or misleading appearance of active trading but did so to avoid making disclosures for his share purchases as CEO as he found it cumbersome.

This was on top of his dislike of the inactivity in the share counter.

The prosecution sought a total fine of S$250,000 for Goh, noting that the offences were committed over a sustained period, with cross trades occurring 31 times across 13 trading days.

While Goh did not directly profit, he was motivated by self-interest and personal gain, said Deputy Public Prosecutors Magdalene Huang and Wong Shiau Yin.

They said Goh was motivated by a desire to avoid a “flat line” on the share counter of Eurosports, as he “disliked the appearance of inactivity”.

Goh was represented by Ms Melanie Ho, Mr Tang Shangwei and Ms Neo Yi Ling from WongPartnership.

They sought a fine of S$180,000 instead, saying this was Goh’s first brush with the law.

HUMBLE BEGINNINGS: LAWYERS

The defence lawyers said Goh started from humble beginnings, with only an O-Level education. After that, he worked in his father’s motor workshop and learned the automobile trade.

He began Eurosports in 1998, initially distributing only the Lotus brand.

The lawyers said Eurosports was a relatively illiquid counter, with the average daily traded volume of shares at the time of the offences being 447,928. This was only 0.18 per cent of the total issued shares.

They said that Goh likened the absence of trading activity to a flat line in the intensive care unit – a symbol of death.

“For the company whose listing represented the culmination of his life’s work, Mr Goh wanted to create ‘blips’ in trading activity to avoid this ‘flat line’,” said the lawyers.

They said Goh was motivated by “vanity, not deception”.

They added that there was a “limited scale” of market distortion and no evidence of any investor loss or any financial benefit to Goh.

The lawyers added that the proceedings have been “hanging over” Goh’s head for about four years since investigations began, and this has taken a significant emotional and psychological toll on him.

Negative publicity has also affected the company’s relationships with its investors and counterparties, they said.

For false trading, he could have been jailed for up to seven years, fined up to S$250,000, or both.