Thai police bust $45.4m online gold investment scam, arrest four Chinese ‘kingpins’

BANGKOK – The Thai police say they have busted a 1.2 billion-baht (S$45.4 million) online gold investment scam run by four Chinese nationals and 22 Thai accomplices.

Details of the bust were revealed at a Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) press conference on Tuesday.

The CIB raided some locations in Bangkok and other Thai provinces, carrying arrest warrants for 50 suspects. Investigators arrested 26 of the suspects and seized 30.9 million baht of assets.

Operation chief Thirapas Yungyuen said eight locations were searched in Bangkok, six in Tak, two in Pathum Thani, and one each in Samut Prakan, Chon Buri, Surin and Chaiyaphum.

The police seized Bitkub digital currency accounts totalling 28 million baht and 23 bank books. Also confiscated during the raids were 21 mobile phones, 19 SIM cards, 100,000 baht in cash and eight notebook computers.

The gang members allegedly used fake Aurora Gold Trading Facebook pages to lure victims into investing, and promised high returns of 20 per cent to 30 per cent. When the victims found that they could not withdraw their money, the gang gave various excuses before blocking them from the pages.

Numerous victims were deceived by the scam, said Colonel Thirapas.

The gang worked systematically, dividing responsibilities for buying and creating fake Facebook pages, publishing deceiving posts, chatting with and deceiving victims, receiving transfers from victims via mule accounts, and laundering money, he said.

The Chinese bosses hired Thais to open three nominee companies to help them launder the money, he added.

The gang used three tiers of bank accounts owned by Thais before eventually transferring the money to accounts owned by the Chinese bosses, who would then launder it via three methods.

In one of the methods, the gang would buy goods such as fertiliser, air-conditioners and auto parts, and use a nominee firm to export them to Laos and Cambodia.

They used a separate firm to buy digital currencies via Bitkub, and another to buy properties in Thailand.

Col Thirapas said that 1.2 billion baht was in circulation between the three companies.

Most suspects had denied the charges, but some had partially confessed to crimes, he added.

Call-centre gangs usually operate in neighbouring countries to prey on Thais, but this gang operated in Thailand using the Internet instead of phones to deceive victims, explained CIB commissioner Jiraphop Phuridej.

He said the CIB had been monitoring the four Chinese bosses for some time and found that they had been in and out of the country several times.

He also mentioned that the Thai accomplices mostly worked as secretaries, nominee directors and mule account holders.

The police are investigating whether Thai legal advisers of the three nominee companies knew about the crimes. THE NATION/ASIA NEWS NETWORK