“Once LionGold hit John’s target amount of 10 million ounces in gold resources, he said that he would get Malaysia’s state-linked fund to buy the LionGold shares which he controlled,” said Lau, who did not name the fund. “This would allow him to make a phenomenal profit since the share price of LionGold at the end of his plan would be greatly elevated from where it started out from (before his plan was set in motion),” Lau added.
The ultimate goal of accused John Soh Chee Wen was to sell LionGold Corp to a “state-linked Malaysian fund”, according to Leroy Lau Chee Heong (photo), the latest prosecution witness to take the stand at Soh’s trial.
In his conditioned statement, Lau, a former trader with DMG Securities, described how Soh had planned a series of “corporate moves” to acquire gold mining concessions to expand LionGold. First listed as a China-based paper shredder Asia Tiger, LionGold’s first gold mining concession came about via the contacts of Daim Zainuddin, a former finance minister of Malaysia. Wira Dani Abdul Daim, the latter’s son, was a former director of LionGold as well as chairman of ISR Capital, now known as Reenova Investment Holding, which was also controlled by Soh at that time.
