Bursa Malaysia today issued a statement denying a media report that it had absolved tycoon Vincent Tan of wrongdoing over a May 12 announcement made by Berjaya Corp Berhad.

vincent tan sports betting Tan’s ( right in photo ) Berjaya Corp had, in a filing last month with the stock exchange, said that the Finance Ministry had issued Ascot Sports Sdn Bhd a sports betting licence.

Website Malaysian Insider reported today that Bursa Malaysia would not question Berjaya Corp over the company’s announcement of its intended acquisition of a controlling stake in Ascot Sports, as it was “not unconditional”.

“Bursa Malaysia further clarifies that it did not say that ‘because of the conditions of the proposed acquisition, Berjaya Corporation did not deliberately mislead shareholders or Bursa Malaysia’,” added the press statement.

“We take a serious view of statements attributed to Bursa Malaysia which were not represented as such.”

Should Berjaya Corp be found to have provided false information to Bursa Malaysia, the company can face a fine of face up to RM3 million fine or a jail term not exceeding 10 years or both.

Malaysian Insider

has since made a correction to its report.

Fall in Berjaya shares

Petaling Jaya Utara parliamentarian Tony Pua has today asked whether Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is also finance minister, had lied in his statement yesterday.

Najib, in a written parliamentary reply yesterday, had said that the licence has yet to be issued as the government was still waiting for public feedback on the matter.

"This is a clear and direct contradiction to the Finance Ministry announcement yesterday. If public feedback was still required, Berjaya should not have made that announcement," he told reporters.

Meanwhile, shares of Berjaya Corp took a battering today, down by 6.2 percent following the government’s statement yesterday that it had yet to approve its sports betting licence.