But can the Receiver do as he pleases? Can he drag this on for years and years without anyone holding him accountable?
At the same time, it's very suspicious that it's been approximately one year since the account was unfrozen and here we are, still waiting. You would think that one year has given the Receiver plenty of time to comply with Novo's demand in order to allow the release of the funds.
Novo has been earning interest on the money, so has no reason to make it easy for the funds to be returned either.
The problem with Novo started with the OCIF's commissioner's decision to hold a press conferencing giving the
IRS and J5 an opportunity to falsely imply the bank was guilty of facilitating
tax evasion and money laundering, even though its own two-year extensive investigation exonerate the bank of both crimes. Following the press conference the J5 issued a press release, again falsely implying the bank was shut down as a result of the money laundering and tax evasion originally leaked to and reported by the Australian media and then the N.Y. Times. Those outlets then wrote deceptive articles based on the misleading press release, again implying the bank was shut down for tax evasion and money laundering. That allowed Novo bank to alert the Portugese government of our attempt to return money to customers as being suspicious. So the Portugese government froze the bank's account at Novo for 8 months supposedly to conduct its own money laundering and tax evasion investigation. By the time the account was unfrozen, changes to swift and other issues prevented the bank from initiating the wire requests agains, and Novo refused to act on the original requests the bank submitted prior to and during the freeze. So far the receiver has been unable to get the funds released. My guess is that he is not really motivated to do so, as the longer the funds are frozen, the more money he makes.
Also, to clarify if you recall the bank was unnecessarily placed into receivership on June 30th 2022. The reason given was that the bank was "critically insolvent" and customers needed the protection of a trustee. That turned out not to be true, as one of the first things the receiver did was confirm the bank was completely solvent, and had enough
cash and cash equivalents on hand to make all depositors and other
creditors whole. So I believe the real reason for this action was to help the IRS, J5, and the media pretend the bank was shut down for money laundering and tax evasion. The media company and reporters in Australia unsuccessful tied to use the shut down of the bank as evidence in its "truth" defense to my winning defamation lawsuit, which the judge rightly rejected.
About a month after the bank went into receivership I was able to negotiate a liquidation plan with OCIF and the receiver. We informed customers they had 30 days to provide wire instructions to have their funds returned. Those who did not provide any instructions would have there funds transferred to Qenta. I did this to make sure all the funds left OCIF and the Receiver's control, as OCIF had indicated that they would keep any unclaimed funds. So I wanted those funds to go to Qenta, where they could eventually be returned to their rightful owners.
The bank successfully sent over 500 wire individual instructions to Novo bank and also instructed Novo to wire the balance to Qenta. But Novo refused to honor those requests due to the 8-month Portugese government freeze. When the freeze ended Novo refused to follow though with the wires as it claimed the requests that it still had on file were too old, and needed to be resubmitted. However, by then the bank had lost its ability to submit those requests.
Since then in my opinion the main reason the funds have still not been returned to their owners is the receiver. I think things are also complicated by the amount of money that the bank has spend under the receiver's care over the past 20 months has depleted the excess cash the bank had. Plus a $500K receivable the bank was set to receive was forfeited due to the receiver's negligence.
There is plenty of blame to go around. Had the Portugese government not frozen the account, all money would have been returned over a year and a half ago. The Portugese government only frozen the account because Novo told them the bank was shut down for money laundering and tax evasion. Novo told the Portugese government that as a result of media reports that falsely implied the bank was shut down for tax evasion and money laundering. The media only wrote those stories due to a misleading press release issued by the J5 claiming credit for the closure of the bank, and linking the closure to its money laundering and tax evasion investigation, even though the investigation itself found no evidence of either, and was not cited by OCIF as a reason for their action. In fact , at the press conference the OCIF commissioner said the closure of the bank had nothing to do with allegations of money laundering or other crimes. That statement was left out of the J5 press release and the media reports. But again the only reason the J5 was able to issue that misleading press release, was that the OCIF commissioner gave them the opportunity to participate in a press conference, and falsely imply that its failed money laundering and tax evasion investigation was a success. OCIF has shut down many banks, both before and after EPB, but none were announced with a press conference.
