Fraudulent investments?

C_Mababejive · 23 May 2018 at 6:55PM

M.Elliott wrote: »

They invested £165,000 between the 2 companies, the majority going to helix. .

Gulp...No advice as i know nothing of such matters but I hope it works out well for you and your parents.

newatc · 23 May 2018 at 10:09PM

I suspect this financial advisor has other clients and in due course will be liquidating his business.
I had something similar happen to me about 15 years again though for a much smaller amount.

The advisor recommended putting money into scheme which was as safe as money in the bank (put the claim in writing!).
From memory the investment lost 85% of the original investment.
I complained to the company and amazingly (to me at the time) they rejected it saying the risk was made clear to me.
I complained to the FSA (or equivalent then) but while they were investigating the company went into liquidation (I suspect there were many claimants).
The case was passed to FSCS who relatively quickly compensated me for the loss plus interest.

All together it took several months of course.

Hopefully M.Elliot your parents will get a similar result although of course they might lose out because of the limits (hopefully the investments were in both their names).

M.Elliott · 24 May 2018 at 9:57AM

Glad it all worked out well for you newatc !!!55357;!!!56898; hope my parents get a positive result but every day is a nightmare for them at present. Their financial adviser is less than us less, makes them feel like a bother if the phone to ask if there is any updates and just says the same thing all the time; they need to wait on the outcome of the court cases and he knows as much as them. Unbelievable really.

Malthusian · 24 May 2018 at 10:05AM

I can't fathom why they are even calling him. All they are ever going to get from him is insult on top of injury.

The only contact with him that is of any point is to send the complaint letter and start the process of recovery.

Aegis · 24 May 2018 at 10:05AM

M.Elliott wrote: »

Glad it all worked out well for you newatc !!!55357;!!!56898; hope my parents get a positive result but every day is a nightmare for them at present. Their financial adviser is less than us less, makes them feel like a bother if the phone to ask if there is any updates and just says the same thing all the time; they need to wait on the outcome of the court cases and he knows as much as them. Unbelievable really.

Unfortunately also probably quite accurate, in that he cannot give information he doesn't have. It's hard to have any sympathy for him though, as he peddled this unregulated rubbish in the first place.

M.Elliott · 24 May 2018 at 10:10AM

They haven't phoned in a couple of weeks now as last time he hot quite ratty as if they were in inconvenience. No they know it's action time now. I can see there has been an update from the court case on the 17th may but as I'm not subscribed to anything I can't see the whole thing. I think it was on off shore alert if anyone can help?

Malthusian · 24 May 2018 at 11:11AM

I really wouldn't try to follow the ins and outs of the court case too closely, because a complaint regarding bad advice (with subsequent FOS and/or FSCS claims if necessary) is overwhelmingly the best chance of any recovery, not the court case.

Even I'm not interested enough in dodgy investments to subscribe to Offshore Wealth for $90 a month. However, I do know a bit about this court case from the Privilege Wealth administrator's reports.

The gist is that before it collapsed, Privilege Wealth spent investors' money on acquiring various payday loan books, among which were a company called Rosebud Lending which lends money to Sioux Indians. (I'm not making this up.)

Helix says that in exchange for lending Privilege money, Privilege gave them security over the Rosebud loans, and if there's any money that can be recovered from Rosebud, it belongs to Helix and Helix alone. The Privilege administrators say Helix's security is invalid and the Rosebud loans still belong to Privilege, and Helix have to share nicely with the other creditors. The question of whether Helix does now own the Rosebud loan book is now being thrashed out in court.

The reason I don't think any of this is important is because it's entirely uncertain over whether the payday loans to the Sioux Indians are worth anything. Even if Helix win the court case and take ownership of the Rosebud loan book, it could still turn out that the Sioux Indians aren't ever going to pay enough of those loans back for there to be any meaningful return to your parents from Helix.

eskbanker · 24 May 2018 at 11:30AM

Cowboys supporting Indians, you couldn't make it up!

Reaper · 24 May 2018 at 12:08PM

Malthusian wrote: »

among which were a company called Rosebud Lending which lends money to Sioux Indians. (I'm not making this up.)

Going off topic even more Rosebud Lending had been rather naughty trading under a variety of different names including where they were not meant to:
https://dfi.wa.gov/consumer/alerts/rosebud-sioux-tribe

As Mathusian advises I would concentrate on the formal complaints and forget the court case.

M.Elliott · 24 May 2018 at 12:08PM

I had to have a little laugh at that eskbanker despite the situation. Thanks Malthusian I have read all that, have became slightly obsessed with it all since I found out and read everything I can get my hands on. I also see that the joint administrators are looking into the possibility it was a ponzi scheme. This is all new to me, never had to think about anything like this before. Would be interested to know what is being said at court though.

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Fraudulent investments?

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