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On 14 October 2025, 30-year-old Pi Jiapeng (“Pi”) was convicted and sentenced to an imprisonment term of five years and 10 months for the following offences:

1. One count of carrying on a business for a fraudulent purpose under Section 238(1) of the Insolvency, Restructuring and Dissolution Act 2018 (“IRDA”) and punishable under Section 238(4) of the same Act;
   
   
2. One count of failing to exercise reasonable diligence in the discharge of his duties as a director of a company under Section 157(1) of the Companies Act 1967 (“Companies Act”) and punishable under Section 157(3)(b) of the same Act; and
   
   
3. One count of possessing benefits from criminal conduct under Section 54(3) of the Corruption, Drug Trafficking and Other Serious Crimes (Confiscation of Benefits) Act 1992 (“CDSA”) and punishable under Section 54(5)(a) of the same Act.

Another four offences under the Immigration Act 1959, Criminal Procedure Code 2010 (“CPC”), Penal Code 1871 (“Penal Code”) and CDSA were also taken into consideration for the purposes of sentencing. These included offences of leaving Singapore without presenting a passport to an immigration officer, failing to report for bail, refusing to sign a statement, and moving a sum of more than $20,000 out of Singapore without providing a report.

Background

Between May 2022 and August 2022, 187 police reports were filed against Tradenation Pte Ltd (“Tradenation”) and Tradeluxury Pte Ltd (“Tradeluxury”). The complainants alleged that both companies failed to fulfil orders for luxury watches and luxury bags despite receiving full payment.

Pi was the registered director of both companies. At Tradenation, Pi made withdrawals and transfers from the company’s bank account on the instructions of his wife, Pansuk Siwiripa’s (“Pansuk”). He also occasionally liaised with customers regarding orders and delivered the goods to customers. At Tradeluxury, he had   no substantive involvement despite being the company’s director. Pansuk was the main decision-maker for both companies and was responsible for communicating with customers, sourcing suppliers and arranging the delivery of goods. She was sentenced on 29 October 2024 to an imprisonment term of 14 years for offences under the IRDA, Penal Code, CPC and CDSA, with another 150 offences under the Penal Code, CDSA, CPC and Immigration Act 1959 taken into consideration for the purposes of sentencing.

Both companies operated primarily as re-sellers of luxury watches and bags on a pre-order basis, offering the goods for sale online. When customers placed orders, they were required to make full payments in advance, prior to the companies procuring and delivering the goods. This pre-order price was generally fixed at 10% to 20% lower than that of other local resellers.

Investigation Findings

Investigations by the Commercial Affairs Department ("CAD") revealed that by February 2022, both companies were operating at significant losses, as they were sourcing their goods at a higher price than they sold to customers. 

Charge for Carrying on a Business for a Fraudulent Purpose

By March 2022, Pi was aware that there was a substantial risk that the companies might not be able to fulfil the orders accepted, as they were operating at a loss. Despite this, Pi allowed Pansuk to continue running the business of Tradenation and continued to process transfers and cash withdrawals as requested by her. In January and February 2022 alone, Pi processed cash cheques from Tradenation’s bank account for approximately $3.2 million. Pi was therefore a party to the carrying on of the business of Tradenation for a fraudulent purpose, by taking orders for the luxury goods and collecting payments when he knew that Tradenation did not have a reasonable expectation of fulfilling these orders. From March 2022 to June 2022, Tradenation collected a total amount of $24,782,798 for orders which were eventually unfulfilled.

Charge for Breach of Director’s Duties

Despite being the director of Tradeluxury and authorised signatory of its bank account, Pi had no substantive involvement in Tradeluxury’s business. He allowed Pansuk to operate Tradeluxury for a fraudulent purpose, where she took orders for luxury bags when she knew that Tradeluxury did not have any reasonable expectation of fulfilling these orders given its financial condition.

Between 9 March 2022 and 3 May 2022, Pi failed to exercise supervision over the affairs of Tradeluxury, which resulted in the carrying on of Tradeluxury’s business for a fraudulent purpose. The total amount of payments collected from the customers of Tradeluxury was $946,948 and none of these customers received the goods they had ordered.

Charge for Money Laundering

On 13 April 2022, Pansuk transferred S$176,361.48 from her OCBC account to a car retailer as downpayment for the purchase of a Chevrolet Corvette C8 2Lt (the “Corvette”) registered in Pi’s name. Investigations revealed that part of the S$176,361.48 in Pansuk’s OCBC account was traced to inflows from customers of Tradenation. Between 13 April 2022 and 29 June 2022, Pi possessed the Corvette despite having reasonable grounds to believe that it represented Pansuk’s benefits of criminal conduct.