June 29, 2011  Today the Joint Liquidators of Stanford International Bank in Antigua, announced that they were making progress in their efforts to ensure that the efforts of the various stakeholders were focused on maximizing the total recovery for victims.

“We have resolved not to have litigation between the various interests if it can possibly be avoided ” says Hugh Dickson, of Grant Thornton Cayman one of the Joint Liquidators, “instead we want to work co-operatively with those actively involved in asset recovery to ensure that the person best suited to take on any individual asset recovery action is the person who takes that action. Also we are trying to avoid a duplication of distribution processes as multiple proceedings will not be cost effective.  This means trying to respect the laws and processes of the various jurisdictions.  For example, in Antigua there is a statutory obligation and a format to be followed for a claims and distribution process that we can’t avoid, so the issue is can we run this co-operatively with the US proceeding in an way that is acceptable to both countries.”

In an effort to accomplish this the Joint Liquidators have met with the Serious Fraud Office in the UK, the US Receiver, the US Creditor Committee, the Department of Justice, the Swiss prosecutor and the Trustee Stanford Bank interests in Switzerland, and had discussions with the Attorney General’s office in Ontario, Canada.

“All these parties, including us, claim to have control over various of the Stanford assets” said Marcus Wide the other Joint Liquidator from  his Grant Thornton office in the British Virgin Islands,  “ and the question is can we find a way through what we hope are superficially different mandates to serve the victims who are the ultimate stakeholders.  We are encouraged that at present it seems that there is a general will to do that.  We will certainly do our best to play our part and be drivers of the process”.

Mr. Wide cautions that while there are overlying common interests, the differing responsibilities in the mandates may in fact  be more that superficial, and finding a way to reconcile these may prove challenging and take time to resolve.