Fraud charges filed against PIPC people Tina Santos Inquirer
August 17, 2007
MANILA, Philippines -- The National Bureau of Investigation filed charges of syndicated fraud on Friday against 32 officers, incorporators and employees of the Performance Investment Products Corp. (PIPC) and PIPC Corp.
Charged with syndicated estafa at the Department of Justice were Michael H.K. Liew, the Singaporean owner of PIPC and chair of the board and president of PIPC Corp.; his business partner Chua Pwey Chan, alias Albert Chua; Cristina Gonzales-Tuason, PIPC Corp. general manager and treasurer; and Ma. Cristina Jurado and Manuel Gonzales, PIPC Corp. corporate secretaries.
Also charged were Ernesto Sy, Gabriel Dee, Mario Lorenzo, Jonas-Karl Perez and Peter Donnely Barot, PIPC Corp incorporators.
The NBI likewise charged with the same offense at least 22 employees or marketing agents who allegedly enticed investors to invest in the company.
The case stemmed from the complaints filed by at least 21 investors who put up a total of $1.5 million or P75 million.
Investigation showed that from 2001 to July 2007, the complainants were duped into investing in PIPC’s foreign exchange trading operations.
The complainants told NBI that they invested the required minimum of $40,000.
They claimed that their investments were traded by PIPC into multiple contracts and were told that their money would be 100 percent guaranteed and protected from any loss for a trading cycle of eight weeks.
PIPC offered one to two percent monthly earnings on their investments, where 60 percent of the earnings net of trading commissions and management fees would be credited to their respective bank accounts within 14 working days, the complainants said.
They added that they were required to wire their investment through any of the three foreign banks where PIPC maintained accounts, namely Standard Chartered Bank-Hong Kong, ABN Amro (Hong Kong and Japan) and Chase Manhattan-New York.
PIPC is the foreign exchange trading firm whose Singaporean owner allegedly disappeared with at least $250 million of investors' money.
PIPC Corp, on the other hand, was registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission as a financial research and information technology firm.
However, the NBI believes that the two companies are one and the same.
Lawyer Ruel Lasala, NBI regional director and chief of the National Capital Region, said it appears that the incorporators of PIPC Corp. only used PIPC to entice investors.
PIPC, he said, was not registered with SEC.
"It appears that the respondents only used PIPC as a front. Maybe it was really their plan to use a non-existing firm (PIPC) to lure investors, thinking that it would be easy for them to elude charges by claiming that they were connected to a different company (PIPC Corp)," he explained.
The respondents in the investment scam were the same persons comprising the set of directors, officers and employees of PIPC Corp. engaged in soliciting capital investments from investors for PIPC, Lasala added.
Citing a verification made with SEC, Lasala added that PIPC and PIPC Corp. (formerly Caravaggio Holdings Inc.) hold office at the same business address on the 15th and 31st floors of the Citibank Tower, No. 8741, Paseo de Roxas, Makati City.
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, meanwhile, certified that PIPC was not registered and authorized to engage in foreign trading or any similar type of business, the NBI said.
"Evidence at hand clearly shows the grand conspiracy perpetrated by the respondents to defraud the investors. Investors were deceived, damaged and prejudiced, a clear case of investment scam," Lasala said.
He said SEC will also file charges for violation of the SEC rules and regulation against the PIPC Corp. officers and incorporators.
The Anti-Money Laundering Council will also take appropriate legal actions in the identification, freezing and forfeiture of all the assets and accounts of PIPC Corp., particularly against Liew, among others.
Claro de Castro, chief of the NBI Interpol, said Liew and Chua were tagged by the International Police Organization with a "red notice" and will be arrested in any country where they may be found.
