Yuanta chief Ma under probe for merger case

Prosecutors investigating graft related to former President Chen Shui-bian and his family declined to reveal yesterday if they had already interviewed Ma Ji-ling, the top executive of Yuanta. But Lin Chin-tsun, spokesman of the Taipei Prosecutors Office, confirmed that Ma was questioned by prosecutors in his office on Monday, and released on NT$20 million bail for a different case.

Ma was alleged to have been involved in possible irregular stock transactions related to a 2005 merger and acquisition case.

Tu Li-chuang, Ma’s wife and chairwoman of the group’s Yuanta Securities Co., was named a defendant and freed on bail of NT$10 million after a raid on Yuanta offices in July this year.

Two of Tu’s senior aides were also named in the same case and released on NT$7 million and NT$2 million bail.

The case involving Yuanta Securities Investment and Consulting Co.’s massive investment in the structured notes pegged to the interest rate on the U.S. dollar deposits.

But the firm faced high risk exposure after the U.S. raised the benchmark interest rate in 2004, causing a slide in the net value of the notes.

Yuanta Securities Co. then moved to purchase shares of the investment firm, then held by other affiliated firms, for alleged profit of about NT$1 billion in the transactions.

Yuanta executives defended the merger as a measure to consolidate the investment firms into the Yuanta Financial Holding Group.

All the transactions were legitimate and broke no regulations, they said.

They also stressed the merger case had nothing to do with the structured notes.

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