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A Judge of the Appellate Division (JAD) has ruled that a S$1 million red packet is to be included in the matrimonial assets to be split between a divorced couple, reversing a previous High Court ruling.

The judgement was delivered on Feb. 18 by the Appellate Division of the High Court after both parties, only identified in court documents by H (husband) and W (wife), appealed against the decision of a judge of the General Division of the High Court.

The Appellate Division handles civil appeals against decisions made by the General Division of the High Court that are within its jurisdiction.

Appeals can only be brought against the Appellate Division if specific conditions are met, such as whether the appeal will raise a point of law of public importance.

Background

H and W married on Jan. 3, 2015 and their son was born in November of the same year.

W moved out of the house that they had been living in on Sep. 28, 2017, bringing the boy along with her.

She filed for a writ of divorce on Jul. 25, 2018 and an interim judgement was granted on Jan. 25, 2019.

Both parties were dissatisfied with a High Court judgement made on Jan. 28, 2021 as they disagreed with different aspects related to division of assets, along with maintenance.

The appeal was presided over by Belinda Ang Saw Ean, Woo Bih Li and Quentin Loh.

The S$1mil red packet

On the day of his wedding -- more specifically, during the tea ceremony -- the groom was handed a red packet containing a S$1 million cheque by his father.

H's father told the court that the gift was meant for his son alone, explaining that W received about S$20,000 worth of jewellery at the tea ceremony, and a BMW car from H as an engagement present.

The bride also did not pay for wedding dinner expenses.

The cheque was later deposited in the husband's personal account, rather than a joint account.

The High Court judge excluded the red packet from the pool of matrimonial assets to be divided, but the three judges wrote that "not enough weight on the occasion when the S$1m Gift was presented and on the substance of [a] recorded conversation" between the former couple.

The judgement pointed out that H was given the red packet during the tea ceremony, which is a "significant occasion where the parties pay their respects to senior members of the family".

Although the cheque was only in H's name, they found that what was "more significant was that it was handed to H in the presence of both parties at that ceremony", and that "would be viewed objectively as a gift to the couple in the absence of evidence to the contrary, and unless the nature of the gift suggested otherwise".

There was also an audio recording that the wife had secretly taped in July 2017 without her husband's knowledge.

The three judges reasoned:

W had explicitly asserted to H more than once that: (a) the S$1m Gift was for both of them; and (b) their intention was to place the money in a joint account of theirs but H had failed to do. H did not correct W by asserting that the S$1m Gift was for him only.

Overall decrease in amount of money in pool of matrimonial assets

Despite the hefty red packet being included in the pool of matrimonial assets to be split, the overall size of the pool shrank from S$5,416,252.84 to S$2,443,942.18.

This is in part because H's S$1.744 million share of a Bukit Timah property, along with about S$2 million of dividends from shares in an unnamed company were excluded from the final pool.

After taking into account both parties' direct and indirect contributions, the judges ruled that the pool should be split in a 66.5 to 33.5 ratio, with H receiving the bigger share.

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