Alan Stanford's Business Ruins

The financial state of Alan Stanford's business empire is "dire", with assets that are a "fraction" of what had been expected, the court appointed receiver handling the billionaire's companies has warned. In his first public statement since he began his

By None

The financial state of Alan Stanford’s business empire is “dire”, with assets that are a “fraction” of what had been expected, the court-appointed receiver handling the billionaire’s companies has warned.

In his first public statement since he began his assessment, Ralph Janvey told a Dallas court that the Stanford Group is in the grip of a “liquidity crisis” with assets that run into the “hundreds of millions, not billions”.

Allen, along with two other Stanford Group directors and three of his companies, has been charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission with running an $8 billion investment fraud.

Janvey’s statement also warned there is mounting evidence that the assets of the Stanford estate will be dwarfed by the anticipated claims from investors.

Elsewhere, the International Herald Tribune reports that the government of Antigua and Barbuda, where Sir Allen’s Stanford International Bank was based, have moved to seize an island belonging to the Texas-born entrepreneur.

The country, which gave Sir Allen his knighthood in 2006, has been hit hard by the scandal. SIB was its biggest private employer and hundreds of citizens had savings in the bank.

L.D.

«