On 25 April 2024, Michael Philip Atkins (“Atkins”), a 51-year-old American citizen, was sentenced to 39 months’ imprisonment for one count of fraudulent trading, under Section 340(5) of the Companies Act (Chapter 50, 2006 Revised Edition).
Atkins was a director and shareholder of Aureus Capital Pte. Ltd. (“ACPL”). Between April 2013 and July 2014, ACPL offered an investment scheme where it would trade in leveraged foreign exchange on behalf of scheme participants. The scheme collected about S$18 million from more than a thousand investors.
Scheme participants were deceived into believing that their funds had been invested, and that ACPL’s trades for them were profitable. In fact, only a small part of their funds were used for leveraged foreign exchange trading. Furthermore, ACPL was actually incurring losses, not profits, from its trading activities.
Atkins was first arrested and released on bail with his passport impounded in July 2014. When he subsequently failed to report to the Police as required, a Warrant of Arrest and an INTERPOL Red Notice were issued against him. Atkins was traced with the assistance of authorities in the United States of America and he was successfully extradited to Singapore on 18 March 2023.
The Singapore authorities will not hesitate to pursue and bring to justice those who commit crimes in Singapore, regardless of nationality and where they flee to.
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
25 April 2024 @ 12:00 PM