Taipei, Oct. 19 (CNA) Bank of Kaohsiung Chairman Lee Ruey-tsang (李瑞倉) has been appointed to head Taiwan's top financial regulatory body, the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC), the Executive Yuan spokesman Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) announced Wednesday.

Lee will take over from acting FSC Chairman Huang Tien-mu (黃天牧), an FSC vice chairman who filled the post after it was vacated by former FSC Chairman Ding Kung-wha (丁克華).

Ding offered to step down on Oct. 3 to assume responsibility for Mega Financial Holding Co. Ltd.'s violation of anti-money laundering laws in the United States and the XPEC Entertainment case.

New York State's financial regulator fined the New York branch of Mega Holdings' banking unit, Mega International Commercial Bank, US$180 million in August for its failure to comply with anti-money laundering requirements and lack of a compliance infrastructure.

The case involving XPEC Entertainment revolves around huge fluctuations in the company's stock price, which soared on news in May that a Japanese company would acquire a 25 percent stake in XPEC and then plummeted in late August when the deal fell through.

Prosecutors now suspect that the acquisition deal was a scheme engineered by insiders to make money off the stock price's volatility, which led to heavy losses among retail investors.

(By Flor Wang)
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