Singapore has sentenced a top executive from a collapsed commodities trading firm to 20 years in jail for her part in defrauding more than a dozen banks and causing almost $500m in losses.

Lim Beng Kim was the former chief financial officer of commodities firm Agritrade International when it collapsed in 2020 amid accusations of massive fraud.

Agritrade, whose businesses spanned palm oil and coal mining, was among a string of failures in Singapore’s commodities sector in recent years.