A day after Oceanus Group CEO Peter Koh spent more than half a million dollars to buy shares from the market, the company&rsquo s largest shareholder, Alacrity Investment Group on March 16 forked out a similar quantum to top up shares too.

 

According to a market filing after market closed on March 16, Alacrity paid $549,000 to snap up 13 million shares.

 

Alacrity, held jointly by Cleveland Cuaca and Bryan Tan Jie, paid an average of just over 4.22 cents, slightly higher than the average of 4.07 cents Koh paid on March 15.

As such, Alacrity now owns more than 3.5 billion shares, or 14.59%, up from 14.54%, versus Koh&rsquo s 10.28%. The open market buying by company insiders took place in the wake of online and chat group rumours alleging that Oceanus&rsquo management was in a pump and dump scheme in collusion with unnamed institutional players.

 

The company refuted this rumour and several other more last week, which surfaced after it reported a FY2020 turnaround versus losses from the year earlier. 

 

&ldquo The above statement is not true and there is no basis for this statement. The company will also investigate the circumstances around the misleading information and pursue all legal avenues to protect its interest and shareholders, including but not limited to civil suits and lodging police report(s),&rdquo said Oceanus on March 12.

 

The company&rsquo s share price dropped from a peak of 7.8 cents on Feb 25 to as low as 2.3 cents on March 10. It was trading at below one cent last November.