Two former ACB officials deny allegations of illegal business
"ACB has a license to trade gold, and when trading gold, it creates a status. ACB uses that status to trade. In essence, they are similar," former ACB general director Ly Xuan Hai said in the appeal hearing opened this morning at the Supreme People's Court.
According to the first instance judgment, Thien Nam Production Development and Import-Export Joint Stock Company of Nguyen Duc Kien registered to trade in light industrial products, commerce, real estate, etc., but did not register to buy and sell gold. At the end of November 2009, Thien Nam signed an agreement with Vietbank on receiving the transfer, inheriting and continuing to implement the financial investment trust contract between Vietbank and ACB. Accordingly, Thien Nam received the status of trading gold prices outside of Vietnam with a volume of 150,000 ounces, equivalent to nearly 3,000 billion VND.
On December 10, 2009, Thien Nam Company, with Mr. Le Quang Trung as General Director (deceased), signed contract 017 with ACB, determining the transaction scale of 150,000 ounces, the stop-loss limit was 10 million USD. Because the State Bank required the closure of the gold trading status of foreign accounts, at the end of July 2010, Thien Nam placed 49 trust orders to close all gold status of foreign accounts.
According to the accusation, from November 30, 2009 to July 30, 2010, Thien Nam bought and sold gold positions on foreign accounts worth more than 462,000 ounces, worth nearly VND10,000 billion. After settlement, the company suffered a loss of more than VND413 billion and ACB had to advance money to foreign partners, debiting Thien Nam. In addition, Thien Nam also traded domestic gold positions with ACB, worth more than VND1,000 billion.
The Court determined that these actions of Thien Nam constituted the crime of Illegal Business.
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| Defendant Ly Xuan Hai in the trial this morning |
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Mr. Hai said that there are two contents in contract 017. First, if Thien Nam wants to buy gold, ACB will buy it from abroad and sell it. Conversely, if Thien Nam wants to sell, this bank will buy it and resell it on a foreign account. "The contract between ACB and Thien Nam is about trading gold status. Trading gold status and gold price are essentially similar and the same," said the former general director of ACB.
According to defendant Hai, based on contract 017, if a customer wants to buy gold abroad, ACB will place a purchase order in advance and notify Thien Nam. When the gold is brought back to the country, ACB will convert it to VND and add a certain price (fee). “We have an agreement with the customer, if we buy it back, we will get a certain dollar difference. When ACB buys abroad, it is a complete purchase and a partial sale, bringing that status back to Vietnam to sell. Please understand, if we do not do so, ACB will have risks,” the defendant, who was once the general director of ACB, stated.
After questioning Mr. Hai for about an hour, defendant Nguyen Duc Kien was led into the courtroom. After a few minutes of summarizing the appeal for all four charges, this defendant stated that Thien Nam had a license to trade goods. "According to the Commercial Law, all real estate is goods. Gold is also a commodity," the defendant said.
According to this defendant, during 2009-2010, Thien Nam's business complied with the Foreign Exchange Ordinance, Decree 174, and Circular 1168. "Decision 03 of the State Bank only regulates gold trading on foreign accounts," the defendant said.
"When Thien Nam received the contract from Vietbank, all accounts were negative, there was no payment, no gold was transferred. All the gold transferred status was negative. When doing business with a negative status, it cannot be called illegal business, but illegal must be a positive status," defendant Kien said.
Regarding the order placement process, according to the testimony, the defendant reviewed and researched the market for all the order forms sent by Mr. Trung before transacting with ACB. The defendant executed gold status transactions through the telephone recording system at ACB. The telephone transactions after matching orders would be shown by confirmation forms signed by Mr. Trung (representing Thien Nam) with ACB. According to the contract, without the voice of defendant Kien, no orders would be placed.
Present at the court, the representative of the State Bank, Mr. Dang Van Thao, said that Decision 03 specifically regulates gold trading on accounts. Thien Nam and ACB Bank must comply. According to Article 2 of the Decision, gold trading status begins when the buying and selling status arises. According to international practice, an account must be opened to trade gold abroad.
According to VnExpress
