Hanoi (VNA) - The Hanoi People’sCourt on May 2 re-opened a trial involving 15 people who were charged with thefalsification of stock trading documents, stock price manipulation andfraudulent asset transfers.

The trial was suspended last March due to theabsence of lawyers for defendant Vu Thi Hoa and a number of witnesses.

It was the first time the People’s Court hadopened a trial on stock price manipulation.

The accused include 35-year-old Tran Huu Tiep –former management board chairman of the Central Mining and Mineral ImportExport JSC (MTM), 53-year-old Nguyen Van Dinh – former director of the miningfirm Nari Hamico, and former officials of the Bank for Investment andDevelopment of Vietnam (BIDV) and Tien Phong Bank (TPBank).  

Tiep, Hoa and Nguyen Le Truong were accused offraudulent asset transfers.

Defendants Bui Thien Ly and Do Huu Tai wereaccused of manipulating stock prices.

Dinh and four other defendants were accused offalsification of stock trading documents.

Five other defendants were accused of forgery inthe course of employment.

According to the court’s indictment, Dinh boughtthe legal documents for MTM in 2010. The company had no charter capitaland no business operation.

Dinh and Tiep collaborated with bank officialsto falsify the company’s portfolio, which showed MTM had 103 shareholders with31 million shares – equal to 310 billion VND (13.8 million USD) – in 2014 tomeet listing requirements.

Bank officials in 2013-2015 helped the twodefendants counterfeit financial invoices worth 485 billion VND (20.78 millionUSD) to validate shareholders’ capital contributions and the firm’s businessresults.

While completing requirements to list MTM shareson the stock market, Dinh was put into custody and accused of counterfeitingbusiness stamps and documents to avoid taxes and violating lending rules inanother case.

Tiep and his partners continued to put MTMshares on the stock market in mid-April 2016 and he owned half of the company’stotal post-listing shares, worth 155 billion VND of charter capital.

In June 2016, when the false trading of MTMshares was discovered, the company had had more than 1,150 investors, 71 percentof whom had reported the case to the police for investigation.

MTM shares were immediately de-listed from thestock market.

According to the court, the accused caused a 56billion VND (2.4 million USD) loss to the stock market, including 53billion VND (2.27 million USD) worth of revenue from selling MTM shares toother investors.

The court summoned 1.065 victims, 107people with rights and obligations related to the case and 10 witnesses.However, few showed up.

Some 20 lawyers participated in protecting thelegitimate rights and interests of the 15 defendants at the trial.

The trial is schedule to last until May 7.-VNA