Wordblog

The Stanford Super Series in Antigua is getting a lot of publicity (Guardian for example) not only for the cricket but for the antics of their sponsor, Allen Stanford, who has apparently been bouncing Wags on his knees and wandering in and out of dressing rooms.

Sir (an Antiguan title) Allen does his PR lavishly. The small stadium opposite the headquarters of his bank is modestly named the Stanford Cricket Ground. It is a luxurious place with a swish gym and club on one side and the Sticky Wicket restaurant where Stanford entertains guests on the other.

But what surprises me is that more attention has not been paid to the background of this Texan billionaire offshore banker who has struck a $100m deal with the English Cricket Board.

Nick Hoult of the Telegraph’s 20/20 reporter did write a story in July about Stanford’s bank being under investigation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission. But sometimes sports journalists need support from investigative colleagues.

There is not a lot of detail, other than that from the Stanford spin machine, around the web unless you search hard. The Wikipedia entry is laudatory and has strange gaps like the moving of his bank from the British island of Montserrat to Antigua.

Bloomberg ran an interesting piece in 2006 which included this:

U.S. court records show that his core business — the offshore bank — was formed in 1985 on the Caribbean island of Montserrat and moved to Antigua in 1990.

That’s where he ran into problems with U.S. investigators. In 1999, Stanford Financial tried to take over Antiguan International Business Corp., which regulated offshore companies on the island, said Jonathan Winer, who was then a deputy assistant secretary of State. State Department cables sent from the U.S. Embassy described a “power grab” and criticized the company’s hiring of U.S. consultants to revise Antigua’s offshore-banking rules.

A story in August this year on Antigua-Barbuda Net News (published from the Cayman Islands) is based largely on another Bloomberg report but also refers to report in the Offshore Alert newsletter. It would be interesting to read more.