Trading 'expert' ordered to refund fees

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Trading 'expert' ordered to refund fees
Course trainees were upset that option trading instructor's doctorate came from an unaccredited university
By Sandra Davie, Senior Writer
The Straits Times, Digital HTML
March 17, 2009 Tuesday

A GROUP of 49 people scored a legal victory over a self-styled expert on option trading who turned out to have a dodgy doctorate from an unaccredited American university.

A dozen of the course participants said they had paid Mr Clemen Chiang between $3,600 and $4,000 last year for a three-day course on option trading - a complex and risky investing technique which often amounts to betting on share-price trends.

Several had also forked out another $960 for training software and a handful paid $1,600 to $12,000 more for online tutorials referred to as 'webinars'.

Mr Chiang, a 34-year-old Nanyang Technological University engineering graduate, has been running these seminars for a few years at his Freely Business School in North Bridge Road.

He would tell students his own success story of how he made millions, and he drew hundreds of participants.

He claimed to have a PhD in option trading, a rarity in the finance industry here.

But when it came to light last year that his doctorate was from the unaccredited Preston University in Alabama, the group of 49 wanted their money back.

Yesterday, the Small Claims Tribunal found that Mr Chiang had misrepresented his qualifications. It awarded all participants a refund of close to 80 per cent of their fees for the seminar and a full refund for the cost of the software and 'webinars'.

Mr Chiang, who still calls himself 'Dr', attended the hearing but did not speak to The Straits Times.

The Small Claims Tribunal is part of the Subordinate Courts and can hear claims involving the sale of goods or services not exceeding $10,000.

Outside the tribunal, several participants said they felt cheated when they read a Straits Times expose on degree mills last August. The report named Mr Chiang as having a PhD from an unaccredited university.

Sales representative Terence Tan, 41, said: 'I signed up because of his PhD. Option trading is a complicated thing. I thought this guy should know what he is talking about since he had a PhD in it.

'So imagine my shock when I found out that his degree was not from a recognised university.'

Like some others, he felt the course fell short of providing a good understanding of option trading.

Engineer William Hui, who paid $8,000 for himself and his wife to attend Mr Chiang's course, said: 'He should have called it 'Millionaire mindset', because for a whole day, it was just about how much money he made, his Sentosa Cove bungalow and his wife's Hermes Birkin handbag costing over $10,000.

'When he finally went into his so-called method of trading in options, I found it lacking. And then he tried to sell his software for another $960.'

Mr Chiang still claims to have a PhD on several of his websites, but makes no mention of Preston University, which American education authorities have called a 'degree supplier' offering 'fraudulent or substandard degrees'.

Last August, he told The Straits Times that he was also pursuing another PhD at the University of South Australia.

When asked then why he had opted for a degree from an unaccredited institution, he said he wanted to complete a PhD in double-quick time.

Because Preston University was listed as a partner of a private school registered with the Education Ministry here, he said he thought it was an accredited institution.

It was only later that he realised that Preston was not accredited in the United States, he said.

Like other business people who had bought fake degrees, Mr Chiang said then that it helped to pave the way in business.

Checks last year found more than 200 people - including prominent businessmen and financial consultants - flaunting degrees, MBAs and doctorates from degree mills and unaccredited, substandard institutions.

sandra@sph.com.sg