IPOC Capital Partners

Bermuda Supreme Court has set a date of April 27th to hear an application by a local regulator to have a provisional liquidator appointed over a mutual fund group that allegedly exists to launder the proceeds of corruption by a Russian government minister. A petition to involuntarily wind-up IPOC Capital Partners Ltd., IPOC International Growth Fund Ltd., Gamma Capital Fund Ltd., Convergence Capital Ltd., Com Tel Eastern Ltd., First National Telecommunication Fund Ltd., Convergence Capital Management Ltd., Augmentation Investments Ltd., and Telco Overseas Ltd. was presented to the court on January 12, 2007 by Bermuda's Registrar of Companies.

The founding president/director of a Bermuda-registered open-ended mutual fund has resigned after it was disclosed that he had served a prison term in Germany in 1997-99 for fraud and embezzlement. Vidya Sharma, apparently a former Merrill Lynch banker, stepped down from IPOC International Growth Fund Ltd. in October of last year after his criminal conviction came out during court proceedings involving the Fund in the British Virgin Islands.