Nearly $600 million worth of settlements to benefit victims of Bernard Madoff ’s massive Ponzi scheme on Wednesday won the blessing of a bankruptcy judge, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. The settlements, approved by Judge Stuart Bernstein, include a $95 million deal struck with Senator Fund SPC and a $497 million deal to collect money from Herald Fund SPC and Primeo Fund. All of the funds had invested with Madoff, who is currently serving a 150-year prison sentence. Irving Picard, the official tasked with paying back Madoff’s victims, has to date collected or reached deals to collect approximately $10.5 billion of the $17.3 billion in principal that investors lost upon the 2008 collapse of the Ponzi scheme. Of the recovered funds, more than $5 billion has been returned to investors.
