TOP NETELLER EXEC RESIGNS

20 July 2007

More bad news for Isle of Man e-wallet

As the week closed there was more bad news from the besieged Isle of Man-based e-wallet Neteller plc, with the announcement that executive chairman Gord Herman has resigned "to concentrate on personal matters", and will be replaced by non-executive director Dale Johnson as non-executive chairman, both with immediate effect.

It's been a bad week for Neteller, with the news that founder John Lefebvre had joined his fellow founder Stephen Lawrence in pleading guilty to US conspiracy charges relating to the company, and the FTSE decision to remove its suspended shares from its indices.

Perhaps in an attempt to soften the impact of the widely respected Herman's departure, the company said it believes it is making significant progress towards resolving the US Attorney's Office probe into the alleged violation of US web-based gambling laws "by its former directors," and hopes to make an announcement regarding this "within a number of days".

Coincidentally, July 13 was the target date by which US players hoped to be paid out their frozen funds by the e-wallet - that, too will now depend on how soon a resolution can be negotiated with the DoJ. The monies in player accounts have been frozen since January, and Netyeller has already advised that it will not be paying interest.

Neteller said the restoration of trading of its shares on AIM will depend on the resolution of the investigation within a short time frame and finalisation and publication of its audited annual accounts for 2006.

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