Sigapore
Singapore tycoon O.K. Lim built up his oil empire from a single-truck outfit through hard work and high-risk gambles, a rags-to-riches tale that made him a legend among crude traders.
But it all came crashing down when oil markets were plunged into unprecedented turmoil by the coronavirus pandemic and revealed the keen poker player appeared to have overplayed his hand.
Lim — who projected a down-to-earth image but was, according to people who knew him, a “major risk-taker” — dashed to court seeking protection from creditors for his firm Hin Leong Trading last month.
In a bombshell affidavit seen by AFP, Lim revealed the oil trader had “in truth… not been making profits in the last few years,” despite having officially reported a healthy profit in 2019.
He admitted the firm he founded in the 1960s after emigrating from China had hidden $800 million in losses over the years, while it also owes almost $4 billion to banks. Lim took responsibility for ordering the company, one of Asia’s biggest oil traders, not to report the losses and also confessed it had sold off inventories that were supposed to backstop loans. Hin Leong — meaning “prosperity” in Chinese — is one of the biggest industry casualties yet of the crude market collapse, and its demise last month marks an ignominious fall from grace for Lim.
The businessman, whose full name is Lim Oon Kuin, started the company with a single delivery truck shortly before Singapore became independent in 1965. It grew into a major supplier of fuel used by ships, and its rise in some ways mirrored Singapore’s growth from a gritty port to an affluent financial hub.
The firm played a key role in helping the city-state become the world’s top ship refueling port, observers say, and it expanded into ship chartering and management with a subsidiary that has a fleet of more than 150 vessels.—Arab News
