15 under house arrest as stock manipulation probe expands

The Ministry of Public Security's investigative agency placed 15 people under house arrest Friday for suspected involvement in the stock market manipulation scam related to former FLC Group chairman Trinh Van Quyet.

The 15 people, including 10 staff members of FLC Group, are suspected of assisting Trinh Van Quyet in stock market manipulation.

The 15 people, including 10 staff members of FLC Group, were accused of assisting Trinh Van Quyet in stock market manipulation.

Do Thi Huyen Trang and Nguyen Thi Nga are staff of the FLC Group's accounting department. Eight others are executives and employees of FLC subsidiaries: Trinh Van Dai, deputy general director of FLC Faros Construction JSC; Trinh Thanh Huyen, employee of FLC Homes Company; Trinh Tuan, head of FLC Land's materials department; Hoang Thi Hue, former employee of FLC Digital Service and Trading JSC; Trinh Van Nam, former employee of Bamboo Airways; Nguyen Van Manh, employee of FLC's materials department; Nguyen Quang Trung, driver of Ha Thanh General Hospital; and Nguyen Thi Hong Dung.

The five others under house arrest are employees of BOS Securities JSC: Nguyen Thi Thanh Phuong, head of securities services; Nguyen Thu Thom, former deputy head of securities services; Bui Ngoc Tu, deputy head of securities services; Quach Thi Xuan Thu, chief accountant; and Tran Thi Lan, chief accountant.

The house arrests are part of an expanded investigation into the case of "stock market manipulation" and "fraudulent act to appropriate assets" that occurred at FLC Group, BOS Securities, FLC Faros and related companies.

In March 2022, Trinh Van Quyet, then chairman of FLC Group, one of Vietnam's leading real estate developers, was arrested on charges of “stock market manipulating” and “concealing information in securities activities”. Huong Tran Kieu Dung, then vice chairperson of FLC Group, and Nguyen Quynh Anh, then CEO of Bos Securities, were also arrested.

Between December 2021 and January 2022, Quyet ordered his two sisters, Trinh Thi Thuy Nga and Trinh Thi Minh Hue, and many others to use multiple stock trading accounts to manipulate the market, pushing up the price of FLC shares by 64% from VND15,500 ($0.66) to VND24,050 ($1.02) each.

Then on January 10, 2022, Quyet ordered the sell of 76.7 million FLC shares and 74.8 million shares were matched at an average price of VND22,586 ($0.96), without disclosing the information before the transaction.

Quyet was accused of profiteering VND530 billion ($22.53 million) in this case. The police found that Quyet and his accomplices had caused serious damages to buyers of 60.1 million FLC shares on that day.

The investigative agency alleged that from 2014 to 2016, Quyet appropriated securities investors’ money when carrying out procedures to artificially raise the charter capital of Faros Construction JSC from VND1.5 billion ($64,000) to VND4.3 trillion ($183.5 million), equivalent to 430 million ROS shares, and listed them on the stock exchange.

Quyet directed Trinh Thi Minh Hue to sell all ROS shares with him and five others registered as owners to illicitly earn VND6.41 trillion ($273.7 million) from the sale by February 24, 2021.