Police raid Radiant World's Singapore office amid ongoing investigations

The police have raided iron ore trader Radiant World's premises in Singapore amid ongoing investigations.

Its corporate address is at 6 Battery Road.

Radiant World has come under scrutiny from counterparties in recent weeks over invoices provided to its banks.

The US Justice Department is also probing transactions around Radiant World, with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission said to be examining trades involving the company and its creditors, Bloomberg reported. 

Meanwhile Deutsche Bank and KBC Group NV have frozen some of Radiant's Singapore bank accounts, while other lenders have suspended credit lines.

Both banks declined to comment at the time of earlier reports on Aug 20.

Earlier on Aug 20, the police had said in response to media queries that they received reports about Radiant World.

In an updated statement to AsiaOne on Aug 27, the police confirmed that investigations are ongoing.

AsiaOne understands that some firm employees were questioned amid probes.

Responding to Bloomberg's queries, Radiant said it is engaging with the relevant authorities, adding that it would not be appropriate to comment further amid ongoing processes.

Radiant was founded by Pinkesh Nahar in the early 2000s, according to its website, which says the firm trades more than 80 million metric tonnes of iron ore annually.

That would be worth more than US$7.5 billion (S$9.5 billion) at current SGX prices.

That compares to 60 million to 70 million tonnes of iron ore traded annually at Cargill and the 95 million tonnes traded by Glencore's marketing division last year.

Radiant World's Head of Refined Metals Adhitya Sethaputra left the company, less than two years after joining, Reuters reported last month.

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