Former payroll manager, Ho Kai Xin, has been sentenced to nine years and 11 months in prison for embezzling $4.2 million from Bybit.
As reported by the Strait Times, the 32-year-old woman admitted to committing five counts of fraud, eight counts of benefiting from criminal activities, and one count of falsifying information to authorities. Additional charges were taken into consideration during her trial before she received her sentence.
The prosecution revealed that Ho had been using the stolen 5.7 million SGD ($4.2 million) in cryptocurrency to fund a lavish lifestyle since June 2022. Court documents indicate that between Oct. 20, 2021, and Oct. 6, 2022, Ho manipulated payroll records while working as an outsourced manager for Bybit, facilitating unauthorized payments to approximately 900 employees.
Earlier this year, Ho was given a six-week jail term for disregarding court orders by spending around 840,000 SGD ($627,633) from the illicit funds on luxury items and a penthouse, despite being instructed not to touch those funds by a civil court ruling.
Following the completion of her initial sentence, Ho will commence serving her longer prison term.
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Unraveling Ho Kai Xin’s $4.2m Theft from Bybit
Deputy Public Prosecutor Jeremy Bin disclosed that Ho utilized the stolen funds to purchase high-end items including accessories, apparel, and real estate. She made a down payment of approximately 750,000 SGD ($560,388) for a penthouse valued at over 3.7 million SGD ($2.7 million) and splurged on luxury goods from Louis Vuitton.
The first instance of Ho’s theft occurred in May 2022 when she illicitly obtained over 117,000 SGD ($87,417) from Wechain, the payroll service provider for Bybit. By manipulating financial records, she diverted funds into her personal accounts instead of the company’s.
“As her actions remained undetected, Ho grew bolder, engaging in a series of fraudulent activities to siphon funds from her client, Bybit,” Bin stated.
Operating six bank accounts and four e-wallets across various cryptocurrency platforms, Ho tampered with payment records in USDT to redirect funds to her wallets instead of those belonging to Bybit employees.
She subsequently converted the stolen cryptocurrency into fiat currency. Between May 31 and Aug 31, 2022, Bybit executed eight cryptocurrency transfers totaling over 4.2 million USDT to Ho’s wallets.
After acquiring around $4.3 million worth of crypto through deception, Ho laundered a significant portion of the ill-gotten funds to conceal their origins.
The fraudulent activities came to light in September 2022 when a finance director at Wechain detected suspiciously large crypto transactions in the records. Following internal inquiries, a Wechain representative reported Ho to the authorities in February 2023, leading to her arrest two months later.
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