Aurelia Finance

It placed assets of its 800 million Swiss francs ($758 million) Hermes World Fund in investments with Bernard Madoff. Irving Picard, the trustee charged with recovering money for Madoff fraud victims, alleged that in September 2008 when a JPMorgan Structured Investments Distribution Marketing division employee disclosed JPMorgan plans to redeem its money, he was threatened by employees of Aurelia Finance. Picard asserted in a complaint: "The Aurelia Finance representatives repeatedly opposed [JP Morgan's] plan. At two points in the conversation, the Aurelia Finance representatives made threats ... referring to 'Colombian friends' who could 'cause havoc' and telling [the JPMorgan employee] 'we know where to find you'.” Aurelia lost an estimated $800 million of clients' money by investing in Bernard Madoff's $65 billion Ponzi scheme, uncovered in December 2008. ==Post-Madoff==

In April 2009, all five directors of Aurelia's board were charged by a Geneva magistrate with criminal mismanagement of client assets, and with enriching themselves on management fees, finder fees, and commissions paid for fictitious returns that were never verified. They all then resigned from the board. Cattaneo and Stepczynski retained executive roles at the bank, however. ==See also==