U.S. regulators are looking at a web of companies linked to an Argentine man who has done almost $1 billion of deals with Guggenheim Partners as part of a wider review of the massive investment firm, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Diego Ball, whose entities have been involved in about $998 million of transactions with Guggenheim, also has ties to Mark Walter, the company’s billionaire co-founder and chief executive officer, through a former Guggenheim affiliate, according to documents obtained by Bloomberg. Ball’s brother Juan worked at Guggenheim for years. None of the parties have been accused of wrongdoing, and it’s unclear exactly why the relationship has attracted the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Walter, who has led Guggenheim for almost two decades, has been in a dispute with other senior executives this year over management of the firm, and has taken steps to separate his personal holdings -- such as a stake in the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team -- from the rest of the company, according to people familiar with his plans.
Walter’s relationship with Ball raised questions inside Guggenheim a couple of years ago, when the investment firm approved a $100 million loan the last week of December 2015, to an entity indirectly controlled by the Argentine, according to people familiar with the matter. The loan was ultimately collateralized by interests in 17 limited-liability companies, most of which were created days before the funding was requested. Money for the loan was borrowed from insurance companies owned by Dallas-based Sammons Enterprises, which holds about one-third of Guggenheim’s voting shares, internal documents and regulatory filings show.
Conflict Group
Members of Guggenheim’s conflict group and other executives asked for additional details about Ball and his relationship with Walter, and were dissatisfied with the response, said three people familiar with the transactions. They received little documentation proving Ball’s ownership, his background, sources of funding, or underlying collateral for the deal, two of the people said.
Instead, Franklin Monroe Administrative Services, a former Guggenheim affiliate and the agent for Ball’s companies, provided emails and organizational charts in order to show Ball fully owned the LLC receiving the loan.
Guggenheim’s compliance department determined nobody affiliated with Guggenheim had any direct or indirect beneficial interest in the borrower, Kirkdale Funding LLC, and the loan was approved, documents show.
“We looked at all $100 million loans in 2015 and none were handled improperly and all had Know Your Customer due diligence,” Rob Jee, head of compliance at Guggenheim said in an emailed statement, referring to bank and anti-money laundering regulations. These checks were “done more than once on Ball and his related entities and by more than one person.”
Argentina Ties