10 years' jail for 'forex trader' who cheated 13 people of over $4.6m

A businessman posed as a successful foreign exchange trader and even published books and magazines to establish his credentials to dupe 13 people into handing him more than $4.6 million in total.

- Shaffiq Alkhatib

Kenneth Kam Boon Hee, 57, ran a Ponzi scheme where his victims were promised a monthly interest of 3 per cent on their loans to him but were paid with monies from other victims, instead of forex trading earnings.

Kam was sentenced to 10 years' jail on Dec 16.

After a trial, District Judge Eddy Tham convicted him in August of more than 60 cheating charges involving the 13 people.

Deputy Public Prosecutors Hon Yi, Jordon Li and Jonathan Tan stated in their submissions that Kam had dishonestly induced the victims to enter into agreements and deliver loan monies to him.

He cheated each victim of between $160,000 and $800,000 from 2016 to 2019.

Kam still has more than 200 pending charges and these will be dealt with at a later date.

The prosecution said that, in all, he solicited about $94 million of loans from various individuals.

Stressing that Kam's representations that he was a successful forex trader were false, the DPPS told the court: "The accused was, in fact, not an active forex trader at all, much less a successful one." According to the prosecution, Kam had two trading accounts and he was the only person who had access to them.

Records show that between 2017 and 2018, he conducted a total of five trades using these two accounts.