John Chan Boon-ning is known as something of a quiet achiever: a young company chairman who has struggled to emerge from the shadow of his highly influential late father, Chan Kee-hwa.
Now, aged 32, he must face the prospect of an entirely different sort of prominence than that enjoyed by his father.
Yesterday he was charged with theft by the Commercial Crime Bureau and his senior financial officer Alvin Wong Chi-keung was released on $50,000 cash bail and a $50,000 in surety, in connection with the allegations of an $81 million fraud.
Market realities have already forced cracks to appear among the family companies.
Within hours of his arrest on Monday, listed family concerns Asean Resources Holdings and Huey Tai International both issued statements insisting they were managed independently. John Chan was an executive director on both mid-size firms but they were run by elder brother Peter Chan Boon-ho.
'The arrest of John Chan is not connected to Huey Tai and Asean and any of its subsidiaries and has no impact whatsoever on its operations,' both firms stated.
