SINGAPORE: A man was sentenced to six months in jail on Wednesday (Feb. 9) for falsifying his payroll in order to get a credit card with a higher limit on bitcoin purchases.
Unable to pay off his credit card debts, 48-year-old Lim Mingzhong eventually declared bankruptcy, leading to an internal bank investigation that uncovered his crimes.
Last month, he pleaded guilty to one count of forgery for the purpose of cheating.
Lim started investing in bitcoin on an online cryptocurrency exchange for extra income in early 2020. He started applying for credit cards from various banks to get more funds to buy bitcoin.
Around March 2020, he decided to apply for a credit card from Citibank. He was working for Green Engineers Singapore on a monthly salary of S$6,000.
However, he did not declare the income on his credit card application, instead using a pay stub he had previously received from his former employer, Mediacorp, as a template in October 2019. The pay slip shows a monthly salary of S$8,100.
Lim produced two pay slips and edited them to look like they were sent to him by Green Engineers Singapore in January and February 2020.
He used these fake pay slips to submit a credit card application and successfully tricked Citibank into issuing him a credit card with a limit of S$32,400, four times his declared monthly salary.
If Lim declares his actual monthly income, his credit limit will be changed to S$24,000.
Immediately after receiving the credit card, Lim used it to buy S$31,472.13 worth of Bitcoin on the eToro platform on 26 March 2020.
He did not make any payments for the payment and Citibank cancelled his card on June 15, 2020. As at 17 August 2020, the outstanding balance on the card was S$33,638.95 including interest. Lim’s forgery cost Citibank S$9,638.95, court documents show.
His guilt was uncovered after Citibank investigated Lim for failing to pay his credit card debts and to verify his salary with a Singapore-based green engineer.
After the bank reported the case, Lin declared bankruptcy because he could not repay the credit card debts of Citibank and other banks.
At the last hearing, Lim said he was “a little bit lost” over his involvement in cryptocurrencies, losing S$300,000 to S$400,000.
He said it took him a long time to find a job, but he is currently earning S$8,000 a month and six months in jail will cause him to “lose everything again”.
The case had previously been adjourned for restitution, but he was unable to do so. He was allowed to start serving his sentence on April 1 to resolve some work issues.
He could be jailed for up to 10 years and fined if he faked the cheating.
