After months of silence, and taking major blows from the US Federal trade Commission - Atlantic International Bank's Acting Chairman today sent out a release that is a kind of like a white flag of surrender.
The release refers to the Federal Trade Commission's suit in Maryland targeting all the players the Sanctuary Belize real estate scam. Teh release says, quote, The…FTC, for reasons unknown, also named Atlantic International as a defendant. Although the US Federal Trade Commission did not claim that AIBL was involved in any of the alleged telemarketing violations it asserted that AIBL: had somehow aided and facilitated the wrongdoing by offering the bank's services to prospective purchasers of lots in the development….to the alleged wrongdoers. The bank maintains its innocence in this matter," close quote.
And here's where the white flag comes in: The statement says, quote, "as a consequence of this, the Bank of New York suspended the processing of wires to and from AIBL and this suspension prevented AIBL from servicing its customers need for Belizean dollar.s. This in turn has driver a large number of withdrawal requests, which in turn has required that our institution turn to the Central Bank of Belize," end quote.
That means they have turned to the Central Bank for protection and, as the Prime Minister said, are winding up operations. Their portfolios - which are significant - are expected to be auctioned off to other banks in what is hoped to be an orderly wind-up. Atlantic was the largest international, or offshore bank in Belize. It is not related to the Atlantic domestic bank.
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