Landing page banner

On 17 December 2025, 30-year-old Lee Chia Yen and 33-year-old Lee Ay Ling were each sentenced to 10 months’ imprisonment for eight counts of abetting nominee directors to contravene Section 157(1) Companies Act (Chapter 50, 2006 Rev Ed) (“Companies Act”) and were disqualified from acting as directors for five years under Section 154(2)(b) of the Companies Act. 

Background

The duo operated Interconnect Consultancy Pte Ltd (“Interconnect Consultancy”), a Corporate Service Provider (“CSP”) that recruited two locals to satisfy Singapore's regulatory requirement for locally resident directors. Between June and September 2020, the duo incorporated 109 companies in Singapore for their foreign clients, installing the two locals as directors. These companies were subsequently used by unknown actors to launder proceeds from business email compromise (“BEC”) scams targeting victims overseas.

The duo recruited Singaporeans via online advertisements offering easy income for acting as nominee directors. They deliberately structured these arrangements to ensure that the local directors remained completely uninformed about the companies’ purported business and operations. They knew this would cause the nominee directors to breach their director’s duties, particularly when these companies received criminal proceeds. By doing so, they intentionally aided and abetted these directors in the dereliction of their director’s duties.

16 of the 109 companies incorporated through this scheme received over US$14.6 million in fraudulent funds from victims across multiple countries, including Belgium, Chile, the United States of America and Singapore. The funds originated from sophisticated BEC scams where criminals impersonated company executives to authorise fraudulent wire transfers. 

This marks the first conviction of a CSP following the High Court's landmark judgment in PP v Zheng Jia, which established a new sentencing framework that imposes presumptive custodial sentences for professional directors who systematically avoid corporate oversight responsibilities and the persons who abet them in doing so.

Penalties for Non-Compliance

Any person who commits a breach of Section 157(1) of the Companies Act shall be guilty of an offence punishable under Section 157(3)(b) of the same Act and shall be liable on conviction to a fine of up to $5,000, or an imprisonment term of up to 12 months. Offenders may also be disqualified from acting as directors for up to five years under Section 154(2)(b) of the Companies Act.

CSPs serve an important function in guarding against the misuse of companies in Singapore. The Police take a serious view of errant CSPs and will not hesitate to take firm action against offenders.

Individuals should not be the director of a company when they have limited or no oversight or control of the company. Company directors who fail to exercise reasonable diligence in the discharge of their duties run the risk of allowing their companies to facilitate the retention of benefits derived from criminal conduct.