Court rules for SC in Axis case

KUALA LUMPUR: The Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) has obtained a judgment from the High Court against three defendants for insider trading involving the shares of Axis Inc Bhd.

Axis former director Koh Tee Jin was declared to have breached the Capital Market and Services Act when he disclosed insider information to his father Koh Thiam Seong and sister Koh Hui Sim.

Thiam Seong and Hui Sim also breached the law by disposing of a total of 244,000 and 739,800 Axis shares, respectively, between July 9 and 30 2008 while in possession of material non-public information.

The SC claimed that the material information referred to in the action was related to unresolved issues in relation to Axis’ financial statements for financial year ended March 31 2008.

“This resulted Axis not being able to submit its audited financial statement for the financial year ended March 31 2008,” it said.

Following the judgment in default of appearance, SC said Tee Jin was ordered by the court to pay SC a total sum of three times the loss avoided by Thiam Seong and Hui Sim amounting to RM3,546,477.

Thiam Seong and Hui Sim were ordered to pay SC RM739,389 and RM2,807,088, respectively, which was three times the loss each of them had avoided from the difference in price of Axis shares disposed of against the likely price had the material nonpublic information been generally available.