$250,000,000
District Court Enters $250 Million Default Judgment Against Former Company Executives in Puda Coal Fraud The Commission announced today that the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York entered final judgments by default against defendants Ming Zhao (Zhao), the Chairman of Puda Coal, Inc. (Puda) and Liping Zhu (Zhu), Puda's former CEO. Both defendants are Chinese nationals. In addition to ordering permanent injunctions against future antifraud and related violations, the Court ordered both defendants to disgorge, jointly and severally, $116,000,000, along with prejudgment interest of $17,582,250.84. Zhao was also ordered to disgorge an additional $33,471.50 representing his additional ill-gotten gains, along with prejudgment interest thereon in the amount of $5,224.71, and to pay a penalty of $116,000,000. Zhu was also ordered to disgorge an additional $108,248 representing his additional ill-gotten gains, along with prejudgment interest thereon in the amount of $16,264.73, and to pay a penalty of $1,200,000. All told, the Court ordered over $250 million in disgorgement and civil penalties for the defendants' securities law violations. In addition, the Court permanently prohibited both defendants from serving as an officer or director of any public issuer.