Ascot Fund Suffers 'Major Losses' in Madoff Scandal

By Joseph Major
15 December 2008 @ 05:31 pm EDT

Ascot Partners LP, a hedge fund founded by billionaire investor, philanthropist and GMAC chief J. Ezra Merkin had "substantially all" of its $1.8 billion in assets invested in a fund run by arrested money manager Bernard Madoff.

Madoff, who ran Bernard L Madoff Investment Securities LLC, has been arrested and accused of running a fraudulent fund using a so-called Ponzi scheme whereby older investors are paid off with assets gathered from new investors. The business may have lost as much as $50 billion from various investors.

Merkin, who ran Ascot Partners LP through his Gabriel Capital Group, made the revelation last Thursday, the day Madoff was arrested.

"I am shocked, as I know you are, by this fraud. As one of the largest investors in our fund, I have also suffered major losses from this catastrophe," Merking wrote in a letter to Investors.

Merkin and Madoff had both served on Yeshiva University's board of trustees.

This article is copyrighted by International Business Times.

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