Tan Kheng Yeow (Chen Qingyao) v Public Prosecutor

Tan Kheng Yeow was CEO and a director of KTL Global Limited, a company listed on the SGX Mainboard. In August 2014 SGX introduced a minimum trading price of 20 cents, with delisting for shares trading below it after a transition period; KTLG's shares were then trading at around 11 cents. He agreed with an accomplice that the accomplice would carry out false trades to create an appearance of liquidity and inflate the price, in return for 7 million KTLG shares. Between November 2014 and September 2015 the accomplice's wash trades made up more than 30% of the traded volume, and the price rose to as high as 19.1 cents.

To finance the trades, on or about 5 May 2015 he withdrew $1.001m from KTLG's Singapore subsidiary, of which he was a director, on the pretext of funding machinery for a Hong Kong subsidiary; the money was routed through Hong Kong entities to an account controlled by the accomplice. He pleaded guilty to a false trading conspiracy charge under the SFA and served eight months' imprisonment. Two cheating charges were then tried; at the close of the prosecution's case the District Judge amended them to criminal breach of trust under s 406 of the Penal Code. He pleaded guilty to the charge concerning the $1.001m, with a charge concerning $500,000 taken into consideration, and made full restitution of both sums. He was sentenced to 32 months' imprisonment and brought Magistrate's Appeal No 9185 of 2025 against sentence.

1. Whether the District Judge double counted personal benefit and abuse of senior position already considered in the SFA sentence.
2. Whether the District Judge gave too much weight to the personal benefit he gained from the offence.
3. Whether the restitution deserved a larger discount as a sign of remorse.
4. Whether the notional sentencing range used was too high in light of precedents.

On double counting, the District Judge highlighted personal benefit to rebut his portrayal of the offence as aimed at helping KTLG and its shareholders, and to distinguish PP v Lam Leng Hung [2017] 4 SLR 474, where some offenders could be seen as acting for altruistic reasons. His seniority was an inseparable part of the breach of trust, and the SFA offence addressed a different mischief, damage to market confidence, so considering seniority for both was proper.

On personal benefit, the absence of greed or personal enrichment is at most the absence of an aggravating factor, not a mitigating one, and the District Judge had noted the offence was not motivated by greed. Describing his advantage as a substantial shareholder and CEO as incidental or non-pecuniary was described as a parody of reality, and inflating a share price through wash trades does not benefit shareholders.

On restitution, the District Judge was entitled to infer, under Soong Hee Sin v PP [2001] 1 SLR(R) 475, that restitution made only after the prosecution's case closed and the charges were amended did not show genuine remorse. Restoring the money would not have undermined his defence on deception, since misappropriation itself was never disputed.

On the range, the notional sentence the District Judge identified for a trial, before the restitution discount, was not excessive compared with PP v Tio Chee Hui [2018] SGDC 112, where 54 months was imposed for $1.294m, and PP v Varusai Mohamed Bin Syed Hanifa [2022] SGDC 238, where 42 months was imposed for $751,558, given his abuse of position and the sophistication of the routing through Hong Kong.

The High Court dismissed the appeal against sentence and upheld the term of 32 months' imprisonment for the criminal breach of trust charge.