In the ever-changing investment world, a fund manager named Ma Le has attracted attention with his unique identity and deeds. With his excellent management ability, he raised the once bottom-ranked fund to the top 24% of the industry in one fell swoop, but because he was involved in the largest "rat barn" case in the fund industry, he became one of the largest cases involved in the history of China's public funds. What is even more shocking is that his case has triggered a protest at the local, provincial and even three levels of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, becoming the first protest case of the Supreme People's Procuratorate in the field of economic crimes. The twists and turns of the Ma Le case are like a financial drama that integrates the truth of infernal affairs, the name of the people and the silence, revealing the undercurrent of the capital market.
1. Ma Le: Turning things around on his own
Ma Le, this name once shone in Bosera Fund. He has demonstrated extraordinary strength in the fund management position, relying on his unique investment strategy and accurate market judgment, and single-handedly pushed the fund with the lowest performance to the top 24% of the industry. This feat not only won him praise from the investment community, but also accumulated a great deal of prestige for him personally. However, behind this brilliance, there is a hidden secret - the "rat barn".
2. Rat Warehouse: The Shadow of the Capital Market
"Rat barn", a well-known term in the industry, reveals that some fund managers take advantage of their positions to privately transfer benefits. They often use their own funds to buy stocks in advance, and then use the funds of the managed fund to buy a large number of the same stocks, artificially raise the stock price, and take the lead in selling their personal holdings when they are at a high level to maximize profits, and fund investors have become the last to take over the "wronged boss". This kind of behavior seriously harms the interests of investors and undermines the principle of fair trade, and is the target of severe crackdowns by financial regulators.
3. Ma Le: A well-woven infernal affair
Ma Le is undoubtedly the master of the "rat barn". He is well versed in the way of counter-reconnaissance, and through his wife's network, he skillfully set up three securities accounts, which are held by his wife's classmates, his brother-in-law's uncle and his daughter, but the actual control is always firmly in the hands of Ma Le. He acted cautiously, never operating directly on the spot, but remotely directing transactions by purchasing dozens of bearer calling cards, replacing or destroying them every once in a while to ensure that his whereabouts were hard to find.
Ma Le is extremely vigilant against all contact with the outside world. Whether it's renting a house, applying for broadband, or signing a contract, he deliberately avoids using his real identity, as if he is invisible in reality. Even within the fund company, he never used the company's internal phone and chat tools when it came to the operation of personal accounts, leaving almost no traces of traceability. Such a careful layout has led to the lack of direct evidence to link the two accounts, although the regulator has found a mysterious account with a high degree of convergence and very similar operation methods to the fund managed by Ma Le through big data screening.
4. Accidental car accidents: flaws in Infernal Affairs
Ma Le's "Infernal Affairs" seems seamless, however, fate reveals the truth in an unexpected moment. During a driving trip, Ma Le was in a car accident, and in a panic, he used an anonymous phone to call the police for help. It was this anonymous phone call that became a key clue to uncover the shady curtain of Ma Le's "rat barn". By comparing the license plate number with the phone number, the police quickly locked down Ma Le, and then retrieved the communication records of the phone card to build a complete chain of evidence, and Ma Le's crime was thus revealed.
V. Crime and Voluntary Surrender: Overseas Escape and Homecoming
On May 1, 2013, when Ma Le was preparing to travel abroad, he found that his passport had been restricted and realized that something was wrong. Despite this, he managed to get to Los Angeles, USA. Ma Le, who was in a foreign country, received a call from the company asking him to return to China to cooperate with the investigation. After some inner struggle, Ma Le chose to return to China in early June, and on July 17, he surrendered to the public security organs, frankly explaining the whole process of his "rat barn".
It was found that the Ma Le case involved 76 stocks, with a total trading amount of 1.05 billion yuan and illegal profits of 18.83 million yuan. Surprisingly, despite the scale of the transaction, Ma Le's actual investment was only about 3 million yuan, and at the time of the incident, he and his wife were still renting a house to live without any extravagant consumption.
6. Judicial Game: The relay protest of the three-level procuratorate
After Ma Le surrendered, a judicial battle officially began. In August 2013, the public security authorities arrested Ma Le in accordance with the law, and on January 2, 2014, the Shenzhen Municipal Procuratorate indicted Ma Le. In February of the same year, the Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court made a first-instance judgment: Ma Le was sentenced to three years in prison, suspended for five years, and fined 18.84 million yuan. Ma Le pleaded guilty and accepted the law in court and did not appeal.
However, the Shenzhen Municipal Procuratorate was not satisfied with the verdict, believing that the sentence was too light and failed to fully reflect the social harmfulness of Ma Le's criminal acts. On April 4, 2014, with the support of the Guangdong Provincial Procuratorate, the Shenzhen Municipal Procuratorate decided to file a protest with the Guangdong Provincial High People's Court. On October 20, the Guangdong Provincial High Court issued a second-instance ruling, holding that the procuratorate's proposal that the Ma Le case should be found to be "particularly serious" lacked legal basis, and upheld the first-instance verdict.
In the face of the outcome of the second instance, the Guangdong Provincial Procuratorate did not compromise and insisted that the sentence imposed on Ma Le was too lenient, so it submitted a report to the Supreme People's Procuratorate on November 27, 2014 to file a protest. The Supreme People's Procuratorate formally lodged a protest with the Supreme People's Court on December 8, which is the first time that the Supreme People's Procuratorate has exercised its right to protest in the field of economic crimes, which shows the far-reaching impact of this case.
VII. Final Judgment: Justice is late but not absent
On July 8, 2015, the First Circuit Court of the Supreme People's Court openly tried the retrial of Ma Le's case in Shenzhen. After more than half a year of trial and debate, until December 11, the Supreme People's Court made a final judgment: the original suspended sentence was revoked, Ma Le was sentenced to three years in prison, and the fine was increased from 18.83 million yuan to 19.13 million yuan. At this point, the dust has finally settled on the Ma Le case, which lasted more than two years, and the dignity and justice of the law have been demonstrated.
The Ma Le case has become a landmark event in the "rat barn" case of China's fund industry due to its complex plot, high amount of money involved, and rare relay protest by the third-level procuratorate. It warns all practitioners that no matter how clever the anti-investigation methods are, illegal acts will eventually fail to escape justice; at the same time, it also conveys to the whole society the determination of the judicial organs to severely punish financial crimes and maintain market order. Although this financial drama has come to an end, the warnings and reflections it has left for people are still continuing.