Rising Bill in Unwinding of Madoff ’s Assets

[Cees Binkhorst]

REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl

De totale rekening voor de direkte kosten is nu gestegen tot $600
miljoen. Deze worden betaald door de Amerikaanse belastingbetaler.

De hele zaak van het verhaal van het geld en bepalen van de gerechtigden
gaat dus nog eens een groot vermogen kosten.

November 24, 2009

Rising Bill in Unwinding of Madoff’s Assets
By DIANA B. HENRIQUES
The cost of unwinding Bernard L. Madoff’s estate for the benefit of his
victims is climbing, with a total of almost $25 million in new fee
requests filed on Monday with the federal bankruptcy court in Manhattan.

If the new bills are approved and added to those approved last summer,
the legal tab for the first 10 months of the liquidation will rise to
almost $40 million.

All the approved bills will be paid by the Securities Investors
Protection Corporation, an industry-financed agency that oversees
brokerage firm bankruptcies.

“Contrary to what has mistakenly been reported by the news media and on
blogs,” none of these expenses will be paid with money that would
otherwise go to reimburse victims, the primary fee application
emphasized.

Therefore, it continued, the expenses will have “absolutely no impact”
on the amount victims ultimately receive.

The fee applications were from Irving H. Picard, the court-appointed
trustee for the Madoff estate; Baker & Hostetler, his lawyers;
AlixPartners, the consultant handling claims; a law firm handling Mr.
Madoff’s personal bankruptcy; and eight foreign law firms tracking
assets overseas. The consultant and law firms also applied for $400,000
in out-of-pocket expenses.

Mr. Picard also submitted his second interim report to the court on his
work as trustee, a 79-page review of developments in the case since Mr.
Madoff’s arrest on Dec. 11, 2008.

In that report, Mr. Picard briefed the court on the status of 14
lawsuits he has filed to recover assets taken from Madoff accounts
before the fraud collapsed. He also “anticipates filing extensive
additional litigation based on investigation conducted by the trustee’s
counsel and consultants,” he said.

The new fee applications will be reviewed on Dec. 17 at a hearing before
Judge Burton R. Lifland, who has already approved just less than $15
million in fees and expenses in the complex case.

All of the firms submitting fee applications to the court have agreed to
a 10 percent discount from their usual rates, except for a firm in
Gibraltar, which has discounted its rate by 20 percent. In addition, 20
percent of the approved payments will be held back until the conclusion
of the liquidation, unless the court decides otherwise.

As of Oct. 31, SIPC had spent $557.6 million on the Madoff liquidation,
$94. 2 million of which was for administrative expenses. That is more
than the agency spent on all the other 321 liquidations it has handled
since its creation in 1970.

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