Search for Missing Hedge Fund Millions Moves to Europe

Stephen Harris

25 July 2005

According to reports in the Canadian media, the receiver for investors in the collapsed Toronto-based hedge fund firm Portus Alternative Asset Management has widened its search for assets to Europe. The receiver, KPMG, has publicly stated that it is concentrating on Italy and Switzerland in an attempt to trace how investors' money flowed through the firm's structure and a group of related entities. Unconfirmed reports have now revealed that the European search is much wider than just these two jurisdictions. Portus had about 26,000 investors and more than $730 million in assets under management when regulators shut it down in February during an investigation into sales and compliance practices. KPMG alleges that Portus co-founder Boaz Manor misappropriated as much as $3.1 million. Mr Manor, who has denied all wrongdoing, is believed by KPMG to be the only Portus official who understood the complexities of the various transactions the firm engaged in, including the reasoning behind various offshore money transfers. So far KPMG has located and frozen millions of investors' assets in offshore jurisdictions such as Turks and Caicos and Cayman Islands.