Bloomberg News and one of its reporters have been ordered to pay S$460,000 (US$355,734) in damages after an article it published was found to have defamed two Singapore government ministers, the city-state's high court said in a judgment released on Tuesday.
Details of the Ruling
Bloomberg and the reporter, Low De Wei, are liable to jointly pay S$230,000 to each minister, comprising S$170,000 in general damages and S$60,000 in aggravated damages, the judgment said.
Bloomberg's editor-in-chief, John Micklethwait, said he was disappointed by the ruling and that the company continued to stand by its reporter and the newsroom.
“We argued at trial that our reporting was accurate and served an important public interest, and we continue to believe that the ministers have imposed an extremely strained meaning on what was a solid story,” he told Reuters in an email. He did not say whether Bloomberg planned an appeal.
Background of the Case
The home affairs minister, K Shanmugam, and the manpower minister, Tan See Leng, sued Bloomberg and one of its reporters for defamation over a December 2024 article about secrecy surrounding expensive property transactions involving “good class bungalows” – a prized kind of property in Singapore – that mentioned deals involving the ministers.
The law firm that represented the ministers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Court's Findings
In her judgment, Justice Audrey Lim wrote: “The dominant purpose behind the article was to publish a story about the claimants, in particular about their [good class bungalow] transactions. The broader narrative of how wealthy individuals in Singapore use non-caveated transactions and trust structures to keep their dealings secret or ‘off-radar’ was the cover devised to carry that story.”
Bloomberg defended the story as reporting on trends in luxury property transactions, saying both ministers were newsworthy examples of such deals. The news organisation told the court the article did not allege wrongdoing by the ministers.
Aggravated Damages and Malice
The lawyer for the ministers had called for aggravated damages to be awarded and said the defendants had shown malice. He said in court that when Bloomberg received a correction direction issued under Singapore's Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act, the company responded by lifting the paywall on the article and publicly stood by it.
A Bloomberg editor said in an affidavit that the company had lifted the paywall so that readers could see the correction notice. The hearing was told that the notice was placed at the top of the story on its website, along with a statement that Bloomberg “respectfully disagrees” with the direction and stood by its reporting.
Judge's Remarks on Reporter's Conduct
In her ruling, the judge said Low had been reckless and false in describing the opacity of local government records for non-caveated bungalow transactions. She said that such records were maintained in public records and made searchable through the Singapore Land Authority's integrated land information service, a fact Low knew from making searches as a reporter.
“I find that Bloomberg's conduct in removing the paywall pertaining to the article also demonstrates malice,” the judge said.
