Archegos Capital Management LP made a last-ditch effort to falsely persuade banks its survival was not at stake in an unsuccessful bid to forestall the sudden collapse of the $36 billion private investment firm, U.S. prosecutors said, Reuters reported. The accusation came in a 12-page letter filed on Thursday night in Manhattan federal court, where Archegos' owner Sung Kook "Bill" Hwang has pleaded not guilty to 11 charges of fraud, market manipulation and racketeering conspiracy. Prosecutors said Archegos misled banks dozens of times in the six months before its March 2021 demise about its liquidity and how concentrated its portfolio was, in order to borrow money and make huge bets on stocks through total return swaps. The letter said that Archegos' strained finances led to a March 24, 2021 meeting where senior executives including Hwang and co-defendant Patrick Halligan, then its chief financial officer, decided to falsely tell banks that the firm's inability to meet margin calls was "a liquidity issue, not a solvency issue." Officials allegedly conveyed that assurance to Credit Suisse Group AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Morgan Stanley, Nomura Holdings Inc. and UBS Group AG that night and the next morning, and also misled counterparties about Archegos' cash.
