No ulterior motives for Jimmy Lai’s HK$500 million loan to media firm Next Digital when it was unprofitable, witness tells Hong Kong court
- Royston Chow, former Next Digital chief financial officer, says it was not ‘very common’ for shareholder to lend substantial amount of money to company such as Lai’s
- Next Digital logged profit of more than HK$2.1 billion between 2001 and 2011 before recording continuous losses from 2015 to June 2021
Royston Chow Tat-kuen, a former Next Digital chief financial officer and chief operating officer, said on Thursday it was not “very common” for a shareholder to lend a substantial amount of money to a company such as Lai’s.
The former top executive turned prosecution witness acknowledged it was “probably not the case” that the loans advanced by Lai in 2019 and 2020 were “anything sinister”.
Prosecutors earlier portrayed Lai as the mastermind of an anti-China conspiracy linked to the now-defunct tabloid, where he had complete control over its editorial policies.
The court heard Next Digital logged a profit of more than HK$2.1 billion between 2001 and 2011 under its previous name, Next Media Limited.
Its annual reports showed it ran at a profit in three of the next four financial years before recording continuous losses from 2015 to June 2021, when Apple Daily ceased publication.
Lai had received more than HK$1.9 billion in dividends over the two-decade period, according to the documents.
Robert Pang Yiu-hung, Lai’s senior counsel, argued the media company had achieved financial success under his client’s leadership before the changing media landscape began to pose a challenge to its future.
Chow said those attempts were normal business practices, but noted the financial benefits of providing add-on content in print newspapers were often short-term and limited.
He added Apple Daily began exploring possibilities in online publication long before its parent company’s financial woes.
