CEO cites divorce in bid to free assets

An executive caught up in the scandal over last October's penny stock crash has invoked a divorce court order to try to free up two Singapore properties frozen by creditors.

Ms Quah Su-Ling, chief executive of Ipco International, wants the High Court to allow her to meet the conditions of an interim judgment made by the Family Court on Nov 4.

This called for her to transfer a unit at the Country Grandeur in Upper Thomson and another in Orange Grove Residences in Tanglin to former husband Tan Kien Giap within three months from Feb 13.

That was when the interim judgment became final.

Recent sales transactions suggest the properties could fetch around $5 million, agents estimate.

United States-based Interactive Brokers won a court order on Nov 11 to freeze $10.2 million of Ms Quah's assets.

The brokerage is suing her and seven other clients to recover more than $79 million in trading losses stemming from the penny stock meltdown.

Ms Quah has asked the High Court to vary this order, in other words, to allow the properties to be transferred.

The Straits Times understands that at least one of the other clients sued by Interactive has filed for divorce, this time in Malaysia. The client has also made a similar request to Malaysia's High Court.

Ms Quah contends that the Family Court ruling on Nov 4 - made seven days before the Interactive order was issued - should take precedence.

She said she would be in contempt of the Family Court and risk having enforcement proceedings brought against her if she fails to transfer the properties.

But Interactive's lawyers, in court papers seen by The Straits Times, objected to the transfer, saying Ms Quah "proceeds at her own peril".

They argued that the freezing order may be varied only if both parties agree in writing.

Ms Quah described Interactive's objection as "unreasonable". Court documents show that Ms Quah started divorce proceedings on Oct 21 last year and her marriage of 26 years was dissolved on Feb 13 this year.

She told the High Court that she had not disclosed to Interactive her divorce proceedings or her obligations to transfer the properties to Mr Tan because "quite frankly, it had slipped my mind until recently in late January 2014".

She said the decision to get a divorce "had been decided some time before Oct 2, when all my troubles began and the prices of my shares in the companies, namely Asiasons Capital, Blumont Group and LionGold Corp, collapsed".

She said: "The family decided that I would retain all my stock and shares in the various public listed companies I owned and my ex-husband would take over my rights, share and interest in all real property, including the (two) properties.

"After the share price collapse and my troubles began, I was overwhelmed by legal proceedings and the divorce proceedings became secondary to me because everything had already been agreed."

The shares of the three listed firms rocketed to record levels last year before going into a tailspin on Oct 4, wiping out about $8 billion in stock market value.

Ms Quah said Mr Tan began pressuring her at the end of January to transfer the properties to him. But she said she held him off in the hope that the emergency arbitrator in the Interactive case would not uphold the freezing of her assets.

"Regrettably, the interim award of the emergency arbitrator is not in my favour, and I now have no choice but to comply" with the Family Court order, she said.

gleong@sph.com.sg

This article was published on April 18 in The Straits Times.

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