What happened to Cambist?
INVESTORS: LEFT IN THE LURCH AFTER LIQUIDATION
Authorities appear to have taken no action to protect investors or hold anyone accountable for their losses.
trouble. Its future had been shaky since OneLaw, the debt collection company that originally owned the platform, went into liquidation.
Although Cambist quickly registered itself as a separate company and gave assurances that it would continue to operate, users were left without any effective way to sell their contracts or buy new ones. The online trading platform was suspended in December 2014 and never reinstated.
Companies and Intellectual Property Commission records show that Cambist, registered as a separate company in 2014, is in the process of being de-registered. The only listed director is Corne Aldum, founder of Bridge Finance, OneLaw and a number of related companies.
Emails sent to the general Cambist email address and to lastknown manager, Lise Oerlemans, were returned as undeliverable. It appears Cambist has ceased to exist.
Worthless guarantee
While Cambist would never confirm how much money was invested through its platform, Moneyweb
knows of individuals who each invested R1 million or more. At one point it claimed to have 3 000 users.
The frustration for investors is that Cambist always guaranteed the returns it offered. This guarantee has turned out to be worthless.
Further, no authorities appear to have taken any action to protect these investors or hold anyone accountable for their losses. Moneyweb’s enquiries over the last month have led to dead ends.
The Financial Services Conduct Authority (FSCA – previously the FSB) referred Moneyweb to the Reserve Bank (Sarb). However, Sarb seemed to think the FSCA was handling the matter.
“With regards to Cambist, the final report concluded that the business model was not a contravention of the Banks Act, and as such the matter was closed and there was no further involvement from our side,” Sarb spokesperson Ziyanda Mtshali said.
“In this regard, it must be noted that this does not necessarily mean that the scheme or product was legitimate – our investigation was confined to whether there was a contravention of the Banks Act. The matter was pursued by the FSB for other possible transgressions.”