Investors caught in alleged $1.2b scam

The waterfront in Geneva, Switzerland, featured in a promotional video in a move to attract Chinese investors. [Photo/China Daily]

Geneva's public prosecutor launches an investigation after Chinese victims claim 29,000 people were robbed by a Swiss-based company and associated firms as row rumbles on

Chinese investors have flown 5,000 miles (8,047 kilometers) to show up on doorsteps in Geneva and demand their money back. This has been the fallout so far from an alleged scam that its victims say robbed 29,000 Chinese investors of $1.2 billion.

They were promised returns of as much as 10 percent a month from currency trading by API Premiere Swiss Trust AG and associated companies, according to interviews with six victims and documents they shared during the past three months.

The money disappeared from their accounts in January, the investors claimed.

"We wanted to know the truth," Chen Biya, 43, an advertising agency owner in Beijing who flew to Geneva in late March with two-dozen fellow investors to try to recover their missing millions, said.

They sought redress at API's locked former offices, the public prosecutor and in meetings with lawyers. They then went to Bern and Zurich to appeal to the Chinese embassy and Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority, known as Finma. "But nobody has been able to tell us the entire story," Chen said.

Unprecedented billions of yuan flowing from China and into investments around the world are creating opportunities for fraudsters, as well as legitimate money managers trying to get their hands on the cash.

The cross-border nature of the flows is posing challenges for regulators and crime fighters alike.

"Frankly, the law enforcement authorities tend to be focused only within their own jurisdictions and move deadly slowly on investigations," Steve Vickers, of Hong Kong-based risk consultancy Steve Vickers & Associates, said.

Geneva's public prosecutor confirmed it is investigating API and an associated company, Alpen Asset Management Trust Sarl. Both are described as "heavily indebted" by Finma, which initiated bankruptcy proceedings against them last month.

In January, Finma issued a public warning that API and Alpen were wrongly claiming to be licensed and supervised by the Swiss regulator. It came about 10 days after the investors said they discovered their accounts had been emptied.