明富环球破产案乱象愈演愈烈

摩根大通银行

    然而还有许多备受争议的问题，最重要的就是失踪资金的下落。同时数亿美元的资金出现在摩根大通银行（J.P. Morgan）的保管账户上，但是这些钱却并没有返还给明富环球金融集团的客户，而客户本来应该优先获得账户资金。投资者抱怨这种做法不合理，他们应该拿回自己的现金，客户账户应该和经纪公司账户严格区分开来。CME集团旗下的芝加哥商品交易所（Chicago Mercantile Exchange）是全球最大的期货市场和明富环球金融集团的自我监管机构，该交易所表示这种做法违反了规定。

    尽管明富环球金融集团拖欠无担保债权人摩根大通银行12亿美元的债务，但是作为明富环球的客户，他们的资金依然下落不明，在这种的情况下，他们本来不需要祈求摩根大通银行凯恩。詹姆斯•库图拉斯称：“我们主张，如果明富环球金融集团的混合基金来自于客户账户或是非公司账户，摩根大通银行就不能对资金提出所有权要求，即使他们现在拥有这笔钱。”目前交易量已经受到影响，主要是因为投资者的资金遭到冻结，深受追加保证金通知的困扰，商品交易陷入困境。明富环球金融集团的破产受托人表示，目前有名义价值1,000亿美元的300万笔投资陷入困境。

    破产受托人、休斯•哈伯德-里德公司（Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLC）的詹姆斯•格里登向《财富》杂志（Fortune）表示，他已经开始调查摩根大通银行持有明富环球金融集团的资金，但是在调查结果尚未公布的情况下，他不会要求摩根大通银行归还这笔钱。摩根大通银行发言人证实，该银行的确持有这笔钱，由于调查正在进行，目前无意返还资金。

    有位纽约独立交易员正在等待归还100万美元的失踪资金，他说“这件事有点不对劲，你说呢？破产信托人应该照顾我们的利益，要求归还资金，交给法庭处理。摩根大通为什么要抓着这笔钱不放？我不是债权人，但这本来就是我的钱。”詹姆斯•格里登本人曾经在摩根大通工作多年，他的律师事务所经过无记名投票承接了明富环球金融集团破产案，因此，他的立场不足为奇。

Roads lead back to J.P. Morgan

    But a list of contentious issues remains, and at the top is the missing money. While hundreds of millions of dollars have turned up in a custodial account at J.P. Morgan (JPM), none of those funds have been restored to MF Global clients, who should have been first in line to get them. Investors have been crying foul, and so they should. Customer accounts are supposed to be kept strictly segregated from a brokerage firm's money. According to the CME Group's (CME) Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the world's dominant futures market and the designated "self-regulatory organization" of MF Global, those rules were violated.

    Although MF Global owes J.P. Morgan $1.2 billion as an unsecured creditor, clients of MF Global whose funds are still missing should not have to beg J.P. Morgan for relief. "We're simply asserting that if MF Global commingled funds from customer accounts, or cannot properly account for them, J.P. Morgan can't lay claim to those funds as if they were their own," Koutoulas has asserted. Already, trading volumes have taken a hit because investors have been deprived of their own capital, socked with margin calls, or found live trades in limbo. According to the bankruptcy trustee, more than 3 million positions with a notional value of $100 billion were left in the lurch.

    The trustee, James Giddens of Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLC, tells Fortune he has begun an investigation into the MF Global funds held at J.P. Morgan, but he has not asked the bank to return the money, pending the outcome. A spokeswoman for J.P. Morgan confirmed the bank is holding the money and said it has no intention of releasing the funds while the investigation is ongoing.

    "There is something that's a little wrong with this, isn't there? It seems the trustee should be looking out for us, demanding this money back and going to the judge," says an independent trader in New York still awaiting $1 million of his missing funds. "Why is J.P. Morgan holding it? I am not a creditor. This is my money." Giddens himself has a long history of doing work for J.P. Morgan, which not surprisingly voted in favor of appointing his law firm to the MF Global case (and the vote was not unanimous).