London Nominees Offshore Funds - Update.

[AA1]

In April last year, I was very concerned as to who London Nominees were as fair proportion of my capital had been put into funds managed by them. I couldn't find out anything about them and was suffering from sleepless nights.

Thanks to the replies which I got from several of you on Thai Visa, you put me on the right track. Then from my subsequent research using this information, I have learnt a great deal about them and have a much better understanding of their structure and strategy.

I feel that it is only fair on them to report to you that during 2009 their Index & Options Fund increased by 17% which was about 4 times the average of like funds so am very happy with this progress and I am now sleeping soundly!!

Thanks so much for your help.

[Benjie]

I think Madoff was showing increases of 20-30%+ every year.

[nakachalet]

are you serious, aai?

you are happy and sleep well because your money is already happily deposited in someone else's acct to act and trade on your behalf....?

if the increase of the funds is 17%, what is you nnn return.... pls?

i would be sleepless if my money is in someone else's acct and

someone or some traders are trading my money for fun or for profit regardless.... LOL

won't you like to do it for yourself, managing your own cash....? or perhaps you have other more exciting things in life to do....

believe me, managing your own cash or trading your own cash.... is a hunderd time or more exciting than anything else....

if you have time, go to the stocks forum where you'll find plenty of cash endowed person trading for a much enriched living....

Edited February 18, 2010 by nakachalet

[Arkady]

I would still be rather concerned about who London Nominees are and what they are doing. Their website doesn't provide a lot of information about their operations except that it is a BVI company and we know from an earlier TV thread that the website was originally registered at an address in Sukhumvit Soi 33 in the name of one of the principals of Barclay Spenser, a firm that was notorious for its high pressure sales techniques to flog investment products to financially unsophisticated mainly British expats. The index and options fund that AA1 complained about in the earlier thread has now disappeared from the London Nominees website completely. In its place is the London Nominees Football Fund and, listed as "coming soon", is the London Nominees Insurance Fund (can't wait). There is no mention of where the firm is based and conducts its fund management operations, although this is almost clearly not the British Virgin Islands, since BVI incorporated International Business Corporations are prohibited from doing business in the BVI and onshore BVI companies are regulated and taxed. There is no mention of a fund management licence which would be required, if the firm's operations happened to be in Thailand or almost any other country with financial regulations.

The Football Fund has generated quite a lot of publicity, including an article in the UK tabloids about expat sales staff recruited from the UK who jumped ship from the company's office in Sri Nakarin Road because they decided they didn't like the product they had to sell or the company's high pressure sales techniques. It looks now to be London Nominees' flagship product and is indeed the only active fund now listed on their website. It even has its own website which has a lot of gossipy news about football but provides very little information on the fund or its investments. The website does inform readers that the fund is registered as a fund under Bermuda's 2006 Investment Funds Act, although this is not accurate. There is a London Nominees Fund registered in Bermuda but no London Nominees Football Fund. The fund website lists as a part of the management team and CEO of London nominees the former Barclay Spenser principal from Soi 33 and there is a team of high powered advisors from the world of football, including Bryan Robson and Steve McMahon. Messrs Robson and McMahon appear especially well qualified, since not only are they former star players themselves but, unusually they already have track records in the fund management business. They are or were involved with the Profitable Group which marketed its UK "landbank" product in Thailand and other Asian countries. The group hit upon the novel concept of selling tiny parcels of British greenbelt land to investors in Asia on the basis that it would generate extremely high returns in a remarkably short period of time, once the plots were re-sold for commercial development. Unfortunately it later turned that there is little or no possibility of the plots ever being re-zoned for development in the foreseeable future and they are likely to remain as pristine agricultural land for the life times of their new owners. In the event the lack of planning permission will not make too much difference to many of Profitable's investors who failed to secure title deeds to their nugget sized pieces of cow pasture that are forever England. The activities of the Profitable Group are currently being investigated by the Singaporean authorities and a firm of London solicitors, Pindoria, is assisting investors to obtain title deeds to their plots of land.

The football Fund's website provides no details of its size, its fee structure, its custodian, its auditor or other similar administrative information normally on fund websites. These details are probably considered as mere trivia by football mad investors with their life savings burning a hole in their pockets. Even more alarmingly there is no mention of even a single investment the fund has made. Good luck to their investors. I hope they get rich quick.

Edited February 4, 2011 by Arkady

[Naam]

a fund that made in 2009 only 17% is either managed by losers or invests in an extremely conservative way.

Edited February 4, 2011 by Naam

[samran]

Is this the mob which advertise on those little posters above unrinals in the Irish/British pubs of BKK?

Granted, I'm all for entrepreneurship and I tend to do my most creative thinking while sitting on the loo, but, who gave them the bright idea that people would take financial advice while taking a piss?

[Arkady]

I feel that it is only fair on them to report to you that during 2009 their Index & Options Fund increased by 17%...

a fund that made in 2009 only 17% is either managed by losers or invests in an extremely conservative way.

It is good to know the fund in 2009 made up some of ground it missed in 2008 when it had a virtually flat year, up only 2.25% in what was an absolutely bumper year for this type of strategy, due the market volatility around Lehman's demise. I wonder how it did in 2010 which was also a good year for volatility. Unfortunately it is not possible to review the data, as all the data about the Index Options & Futures Fund has been removed from London Nominees' website, as has the data on their CTA Select Sub Fund which had some catastrophic historic results. In fact all mention of the two funds has disappeared from the website which can't be a very encouraging sign for investors in the funds. When the data was still there in 2009, the funds were reviewed in the old thread.

Edited February 5, 2011 by Arkady

[GreenSnapper]

I don't get it:

How can anybody seriously consider buying a fund whose 'management' lives in Soi 33?

[turgid]

London Nominees Football Fund just got into trouble via Bryan Robson who was making all sorts of claims related to abilities to influence the purchase and sale of UK football clubs (and Sir Alex Fergussons influence) to Thai and Indian investors . Is it just me being paranoid or are the same names that were promoting Profitable Plots turning up now promoting London Nominees. We have the old team of Robson and McMahon back again.

[Ricardo]

Is this the mob which advertise on those little posters above unrinals in the Irish/British pubs of BKK?

Granted, I'm all for entrepreneurship and I tend to do my most creative thinking while sitting on the loo, but, who gave them the bright idea that people would take financial advice while taking a piss?

Perhaps they thought it a good way to reach potential-investors wanting to piss-away excess liquidity ?

[Misty]

In his blog this week Andrew Drummond posted a further update on the performance of the London Nominees fund and its associated firms and people.

[turgid]

In his blog this week Andrew Drummond posted a further update on the performance of the London Nominees fund and its associated firms and people.

Looks like most or all of the money is gone then. Much like many alternative investments did well in the early years (on paper) and then suddenly all the news is bad when people want to withdraw.

And what actually did happen to their football fund I wonder. It just disappeared.

[fletchsmile]

As Naam says 2009 was a great year for many investments, on the back of a very difficult 2008. I wonder how they did for you in 2008?

I'm not sure what the "like funds" were that earned only around 4% if your fund beat them 4 fold and what you're comparing to. 4% in 2009 on an investment sounds poor to me. It depends on their risk profile and objectives though.

What I'd also add is: 17% pales in to comparison compared to most major stock indices in 2009: SET +63%, S&P 500 +23%, Brazil +82%, FTSE +22%, Russia +121%, EuroStox +21% etc. In fact of about 20 indices I track only one performed with less than 17%.

You should really try and understand better where your money is invested and what risks you are taking. Reading above doesn't inspire confidence, and that your financial advisor or whoever can't explain to you what risks you are taking is worrying, particularly if you have a "fair amount" of your money. He should "know his customer" and if he can't explain the risks and rewards to you that's worrying.

Sukhumvit Soi 33 in Thailand doesn't really inspire confidence either when added to all the other uncertainties.

Edited December 8, 2012 by fletchsmile

[Arkady]

I've had a look at Andrew Drummond's accounts of The Football Fund and London Nominees on his website. He does a good job at digging up information on the principals involved but hasn't got the bottom of how much money was raised and what happened to it. I suspected from the beginning that the intention was to raise as much money as possible and then fold up the Football Fund and London Nominees' other funds, making off with the proceeds and it looks as if they may well be what has happened, since their websites have disappeared completely. I wonder if anyone has been able to get any money back from any of the London Nominees vehicles. The Football Fund must have raised a few million and they probably didn't use all of it for the fund's expenses. Once the lid was blown off it by Channel 4 they knew they couldn't raised any more money or be taken seriously as an investor. So presumably they would have made off with whatever was left as fast as they could. I wonder if they even manage to leverage it up the scam by borrowing! LOL. Some bankers are stupid enough. Seeing Andrew Leppard in action in the video clips it is hard to imagine him as a futures manager running the CTA he set up for his Barclay Spenser clients without mentioning that he was managing the fund himself. It looks like he took his eye off the ball in managing the futures fund when he set up the Football Fund as that seems to have splatted against the wall too. Managing futures is a very stressful business and you must watch the markets all the time and be prepared to take calls in the middle of night when things happen. He seems shifty and rather inarticulate, whereas these guys need to be brilliant mathematical geeks. Andrew Drummond says he is now running a laundry and dry cleaning business in Pattaya which may be more suited to his talents.

This whole sordid episode highlights the danger of giving the time of day to any of the unlicensed expat financial advisors active in Thailand and elsewhere. Most of them have no background, qualifications or training in investment management, even if they are members of foreign chambers and/or have columns in local English language papers, as indeed Leppard used to have. Their sole purpose is to make money for themselves in any way they can and they don't give a sh*t, if that results in leaving their clients penniless.