By Anna Driver
HOUSTON (Reuters) - The court-appointed lawyer overseeing the assets and operations of Texas billionaire Allen Stanford's companies on Friday told 1,000 U.S. employees their jobs have been terminated and said most of the businesses' operations will be discontinued.
The cuts represent about 85 percent of Stanford Financial Group's U.S. employees, U.S. receiver Ralph Janvey said in a statement.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Stanford, his two top aides and three of his companies with a long-running $8 billion Ponzi scheme involving high-yield certificates of deposit.
A small number of U.S. employees will be retained to help wind down Stanford Financial Group's operations, Janvey said.
Stanford's Houston buildings, where the company has about 500 employees, appeared empty on Friday, with parking garages empty and only security guards visible in the lobbies.
Mark Groesbeck, a financial adviser with Stanford in Houston, said he had not heard from Janvey about the status of his job but there were rumors of an conference call for employees on Monday.
Because the receiver had previously said he planned to shutter the firm's brokerage operations, Groesbeck said he expected to lose his job.
"I figured that was it," Groesbeck said.
Janvey painted a dire picture of the firm's financial health on Monday in a federal courtroom in Dallas, saying that company was in a liquidity crisis and had millions in unpaid bills.
Stanford employees have not been paid since Janvey took over the company on February 17. Many have also seen their Stanford accounts frozen by the court, leaving them struggling to pay bills.
All terminations are effective March 6, so regular salary and benefits will be discontinued immediately and employees will not receive any severance or bonus, Janvey said.
A federal court in Dallas ordered Stanford accounts frozen in a bid to preserve assets for investors and creditors. The court ruled on Thursday that Stanford brokerage accounts held by Pershing LLC with a balance of $250,000 or less can be released.
Worldwide, Stanford and his companies have about 3,000 workers in offices in the United States, the Latin America and the Caribbean. The firm's businesses include financial planning, gold coins and bullion, venture capital and investment banking.
(Reporting by Anna Driver; Additional reporting by Erwin Seba in Houston; Editing by Bernard Orr; Editing by Gary Hill)
