Three officers of the Bank of Bermuda (Cayman) have been suspended on full pay pending an internal investigation into the bank's links with an alleged criminal. The bank suspended Michael Day, Marc Vanmarsenille and David Spohr shortly after one of its clients, Michael Gause, was arrested in Florida on October 15.
A company linked with former Bermuda Premier Sir David Gibbons is involved with a fresh attempt to raise capital for a product that has lost investors tens of millions of dollars over two decades of failure. Nevada-registered i3Dx.com, which is a front for Bermuda-based NimsTec Limited, registered 100 million shares with the SEC on November 12, 1999.
Two weeks after an article in the September 30th edition of OffshoreAlert about a Bahamas-based mutual fund - Olympia Fund - that invests in a business known as Cash 4 Titles, C4T's funds were frozen following criminal and civil action in the United States.The problems came with the arrest in Fort Lauderdale on October 15 of Michael E. Gause, who helps to run the underlying business in which the fund invests.
Links to the Internet gaming industry have embarrassed the Bank of Bermuda and contributed to the termination of its correspondent banking relationship with Swiss American Bank in Antigua. The bank, which is based in a jurisdiction that prohibits gambling, except for special events such as 'Cup Match', insists that it does not provide banking services to on-line gaming operators. However, more than a dozen gaming web-sites claiming to be licensed in Antigua and Venezuela have been informing gamblers for several months that they can open up accounts by wire transferring funds into Bank of Bermuda accounts at Citibank in New York and Midland Bank PLC in London.
A Bermuda Stock Exchange-listed company whose minority shareholders include subsidiaries of the Bank of Bermuda and financial services firm Lines Overseas Management is caught up in what appears to be a scheme to defraud investors on the NASDAQ over-the-counter market, Offshore Alert can disclose. We have uncovered an astonishing list of proven abuses and allegations of fraud and dishonesty against individuals and companies associated with Bermuda-registered investment holding company Mezzanine Capital Ltd., including its Chairman and President, Eric Chess Bronk, although we have found nothing to incriminate LOM or the Bank of Bermuda.
In house counsel Philip Lamarr has become the latest in a long line of officers and employees to quit The Harris Organization, of Panama in recent months. Larry Abraham and his son, Patrick, left in March, trader Alex de Janon
A battle for legal jurisdiction between the US government and four offshore financial institutions in a $7 million forfeiture case contains a number of important issues that will affect all companies and individuals who operate offshore but have US clients.Among arguments being put forward by the US government for jurisdiction over banking entities located in Antigua, Switzerland and Panama is the fact that the offshore companies sell their services over the Internet, which can be accessed in the US; that Swiss American Bank has advertised in the in-flight magazine of American Airlines; and that SAB has correspondent banking relationships with banks in the States.
The Bank of Bermuda has implemented a ‘poison pill' defence to protect the bank in the event of a hostile take-over.The bank announced on December 22 that it had implemented a Shareholder Rights Plan that had been authorized at a Special General Meeting on June 12 of this year.
One of the most ambitious property developments in Bermuda's history that eventually turned into a four-year embarrassment for its sponsors has ended in typically ignominious fashion. Bermuda Financial Centre Limited was struck off from the Bermuda companies register on December 19 by the authorities and, three days later, the listing of its preference shares was cancelled by the Bermuda Stock Exchange.