Yeo Chee Neng, who was later made Swiber&rsquo s chief executive, is also disqualified from being a director of any company for five years

 

The sentence was handed to Yeo last Thursday (Jul 4), and includes a S$100,000 fine for a charge under Section 199(b)(ii) of the SFA due to his involvement in Swiber making a false announcement on the Singapore Exchange (SGX) relating to a US$710 million project award.

 

He was also given a further S$200,000 fine for a charge under Section 218(2)(b) of the Act for instructing his wife to sell their joint holdings in Swiber debentures while in possession of non-public and material information on Swiber&rsquo s financial difficulties.

 

The former CEO was also handed two more fines of S$5,000 each, for two more charges under Section 133(1)(g) of the SFA, for failing to disclose changes in his interest in the Swiber debentures.

 

Yeo, who is also Swiber&rsquo s ex-group president and former executive director, was also disqualified from being a director of any company or taking part in the management of any company for five years.

 

Five other charges under the SFA were also taken into consideration in sentencing. These charges include insider trading and Yeo&rsquo s role in Swiber&rsquo s failure to notify SGX of required information.

 

In a press release last Friday, the police stated the charge related to the false statement concerned Swiber&rsquo s SGX announcement in December 2014 on securing a US$710 million award to provide certain services for an offshore field development project in West Africa.

 

Yeo was in 2014 a non-executive director of Swiber, prior to being made deputy CEO in 2015, then CEO and group president on Jun 20, 2016.

 

Investigations later revealed that Swiber, through its senior management, had known that the announcement was materially false, because the company&rsquo s wholly owned unit &ndash Swiber Offshore Construction &ndash had signed only a letter of intent authorising expenditure of up to US$2 million on the project.

 

The letter of intent had merely stated that the contract price was &ldquo estimated to be approximately&rdquo US$710 million and was subject to review after the conclusion of a study by the subsidiary.

 

Yeo admitted that he approved Swiber&rsquo s announcement despite knowing the letter and its terms &ndash which a person in his position &ldquo ought reasonably to have known was false&rdquo , said the police.

 

Swiber&rsquo s founder Raymond Goh and former CEO Francis Wong were fined S$100,000 each for similar charges related to the false announcement.

 

Insider trading

As for the other two charges, investigations found that Swiber was due to redeem debentures worth S$305 million in June, July and October 2016, and was negotiating with third parties to raise funds to fulfil the redemptions, among other operating and financial commitments.

 

Yeo, who was the group&rsquo s CEO at the time, was privy to non-public and material information on Swiber&rsquo s financials and believed that if these fundraising exercises failed, Swiber would go into default, said the police.

 

By Jun 29, 2016, Yeo knew that Swiber had not secured the funds and instructed his wife to sell Swiber debentures held in their joint account.

 

Yeo&rsquo s wife placed an order that day to sell Swiber debentures with a face value of S$500,000, and liquidated half of this position on Jul 5, 2016.

 

Swiber filed an application to wind up on Jul 27 that year, then withdrew the application and was placed under interim judicial management, defaulting on its outstanding debentures.

 

&ldquo In respect of his insider trading misconduct, Yeo avoided losses of S$629,762,&rdquo said the police. He has forfeited this sum in full to the state.

 

In addition to the Jul 5 sale, Yeo&rsquo s wife sold more Swiber debentures with a face value totalling S$750,000 in June and July 2016. After these sales, the couple held further Swiber debentures worth a face value of S$500,000.

 

Although Yeo knew about the sales around the time they happened, he failed to notify Swiber in writing of the changes in his interest in the debentures, which was required of him as a director and CEO of the company.

 

QUETZAL Offshore, a wholly-owned unit of Swiber Holdings : BGK 0%, on Aug 31 signed a conditional agreement to sell a motor vessel, the Swiber Quetzal, for a proposed sum of US$8.5 million in cash.

 

The buyer is Central de Desarrollos Marinos, a Mexico-incorporated company related to the Protexa group, which specialises in chartering and the operation of offshore vessels, Swiber disclosed in a Wednesday (Sept 7) bourse filing.

 

Built in 2009, the Swiber Quetzal is a pipe-lay and accommodation work barge registered under the Mexico flag. It has been mortgaged as security for Quetzal Offshore&rsquo s obligations under banking facilities extended to it. Swiber is a guarantor to these obligations.

 

The book value and net tangible asset value of the vessel are both about US$61.7 million, translating to a loss upon disposal of US$53.2 million.

 

Based on an independent valuation, the vessel has an open-market value of between US$21 million and US$25 million. Its orderly liquidation value is between US$9 million and US$13 million its forced liquidation value is between US$3 million and US$7 million.

 

Quetzal and the buyer arrived at the sale price based on market conditions in the oil and gas sector, the vessel&rsquo s age and existing state, and its orderly liquidation value, given that Swiber is under judicial management. Swiber will use the net proceeds from the sale to partly repay what it owes under the loan facilities.

 

The proposed sale is conditional upon the expiration of the term of an existing financial lease agreement, as well as the approval of Swiber&rsquo s shareholders, unless otherwise waived. The vessel is currently leased to Swiber Marine Mexico, an associate of Swiber, under an agreement expiring on Jun 16, 2023.

 

Trading in shares of Swiber is suspended. 

SWIBER Holdings said on Tuesday (Mar 8) that it has entered into a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MOU) with an independent third-party purchaser to sell its headquarters at 12 International Business Park for S$30.8 million.

 

In its bourse filing, the offshore and marine group - now under judicial management - said its wholly-owned subsidiary Swiber Corporate has entered into the MOU to sell the 5-storey leasehold business park development in Jurong East.

 

This is not the first time that Swiber has attempted to dispose of its headquarters. Last May, the company had announced an MOU for its sale for a consideration of S$39 million. However, it said on Tuesday that the 2021 MoU did not result in any binding sale-and-purchase agreement during the exclusivity period, and that it had lapsed.

 

The property has a land area of around 8,000 square meters (sq m) and a floor area of around 10,841 sq m. Its 60-year lease tenure, granted by the Jurong Town Corporation, commenced in December 1995.

 

Swiber said that the market value of the property is S$34 million, based on a desktop valuation report issued by Edmund Tie on Oct 5 last year. The book value of the property, based on its latest announced unaudited consolidated financial statements as of March 2016, was around S$28.4 million the proposed disposal is expected to result in an estimated gain of S$2.4 million.

 

However, as the property is currently mortgaged to DBS, the proceeds from the proposed disposal will go towards partial repayment of the amount owed to DBS under banking facilities that had been extended to the company.

 

Swiber Holdings said the disposal is in the interest of the company, as it will reduce liabilities and the interest accrued from these liabilities. It noted that since the judicial managers had been appointed in 2016, the property has been under utilised: Just 1 storey is being occupied by the group, with a significant area having been vacant since September 2017.

 

The property has not been generating significant rental income since a past tenant vacated the premises that month past efforts to secure new tenants had also been unsuccessful due to " an oversupply of rental premises in International Business Park" .

RAWABI Holding Company, an oil and gas conglomerate in Saudi Arabia, on Monday signed an agreement committing a US$10 million investment into a new, wholly-owned subsidiary of debt-laden offshore and marine group Swiber Holdings.

 

The new subsidiary will be incorporated in Singapore, and Rawabi' s share will constitute approximately but no less than 80 per cent of the new company' s enlarged total issued shares.

 

Rawabi has also committed to pursue an initial public offering of the new company' s shares.

 

As part of the agreement, Rawabi will also invest US$190 million in Swiber' s existing wholly-owned subsidiary Equatoriale Energy.

 

This comes six months after Swiber and Rawabi entered into a binding term sheet for a US$200 million cash investment in June 8.

 

Swiber shares have been suspended since 2016.