Private company
Bank of Antigua
Bank of Antigua was an Antigua-based bank that was owned by the Stanford Financial Group and was central to the Ponzi scheme run by Allen Stanford. It was originally formed on the 10 February 1981 in St. John's. When the local Bank of Antigua ran into difficulties, Stanford stepped in during 1990 to take it over at the request of Prime Minister Lester Bird.2 Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0
Last updated Oct 21, 2026.
Overview
- Industryfinance1
- HeadquartersSt. John's1
- Websitebankofantigua.com:80
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Bank of Antigua was an Antigua-based bank that was owned by the Stanford Financial Group and was central to the Ponzi scheme run by Allen Stanford. It was originally formed on the 10 February 1981 in St. John's. When the local Bank of Antigua ran into difficulties, Stanford stepped in during 1990 to take it over at the request of Prime Minister Lester Bird.2
Controversies and legal
Stanford fraud
In the late 1990s, the Antiguan government formed a banking advisory board and appointed Stanford himself as a member, despite the board also overseeing his own bank - a move that alarmed American authorities who saw an inherent conflict of interest. The project was funded by money lent or granted by Stanford.
The fraud had been flagged as early as January 2009 by financial analyst Alex Dalmady, who published an article titled Duck Tales in VenEconomy Monthly after examining the bank's public records for a friend considering an investment. Dalmady identified several warning signs, including certificates of deposit offering returns of 7,5%, far above the prevailing U.S. rate of 4-5%, and a compound annual deposit growth rate of 34% between 1999 and 2008, with total deposits growing from $624 million to $8,4 billion over that period.
When the Ponzi scheme was exposed in 2009, the bank was taken over by the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) on 20 February 2009. When the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced its charges against Stanford, small investors staged a run on the Bank of Antigua the following day. Around 200 customers queued in heat to withdraw their money, and Bank of Antigua cheques were refused at local supermarkets.
Local clients were told that processing of withdrawal requests could take several days. Stanford also announced a two-month moratorium on early redemptions of certificates of deposit, telling employees the measure was temporary.
The Financial Services Regulatory Commission of Antigua and Barbuda appointed Nigel Hamilton-Smith and Peter Wastell of Britain-based Vantis Business Recovery Services as receivers to manage Stanford International Bank and Stanford Trust Company. Stanford was the second-largest employer on the island, after the government, with around 1,300 employees in Antigua alone.
Legal disputes
In February 2013, the Official Stanford Investors Committee filed a lawsuit against Antigua and Barbuda, the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, and 23 former Stanford Financial Group executives, accusing them of aiding the fraud. The committee sought repayment of at least $90 million in loans that Stanford had made to Antigua and accused the country's officials of having actively shielded Stanford's scheme from regulatory scrutiny.
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The investors argued that the distribution of the Bank of Antigua's ownership to the Antiguan government and other Caribbean banks constituted a second misappropriation of funds, and that the bank's value should instead be distributed to Stanford's victims and creditors. The lawsuit also highlighted a separate conflict of interest: the head of the ECCB's monetary council at the time of the bank's nationalisation in 2009 was Antiguan Finance Minister Errol Cort, who had previously served as Stanford's personal attorney.
Antigua and Barbuda's Attorney General, Justin Simon, rejected the allegations, stating that the ECCB had, in fact, injected EC$89 million (approximately US$32,9 million) to save the bank from collapse and that no expropriation had taken place. Meanwhile, the Stanford Victims Coalition launched a campaign called Anti-Crime, Anti-Antigua, urging international travel professionals and investors to boycott hotels, cruises and investments in Antigua and Barbuda.
From Wikipedia’s article on Bank of Antigua, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3
Timeline
- 1981Founded Founded1
Links
- Websitebankofantigua.com:801
- WikipediaBank of Antigua
- WikidataQ4856049
Sources
The numbers on this page point here. Each one links to the record it came from.
- 1WikidataBank of Antigua on Wikidata
- 2WikipediaBank of Antigua on Wikipedia
- 3