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Trustee: SIPC Will Advance $500 Million to Madoff Victims
New York Law Journal
October 30, 2009
The Securities Investor Protection Corp. will advance more than $500 million to victims of Bernard Madoff's massive Ponzi scheme, the trustee charged with liquidating Madoff's investment firm, said Wednesday in a conference call.
The amount is a fraction of the $4.43 billion in claims approved since Madoff's arrest in December, the trustee, Irving H. Picard of Baker Hostetler, said.
Picard, who so far has recovered $1.4 billion for the estate, said the balance "will have to be paid out of the pro rata distributions we get." He added that he expects to bring more suits in the next six to nine months, but said he could not "venture a guess at this point" about the size of these suits.
According to SIPC's president, Stephen Harbeck, the $534.3 million the agency has advanced in the Madoff liquidation exceeds the total paid in the 321 proceedings it has handled since its creation in 1970.
