Depositors also besieged Stanford's smaller, onshore Bank of Antigua, as well as operations in Venezuela and Panama.

ECONOMIST: Financial fraud

Hundreds of depositors of Sir Allen's Bank of Antigua in Antigua also sought to withdraw their funds on Wednesday, although the bank is separate from SIB.

BBC: US fraud charge tycoon disappears

Should they have realized that even though the island of Antigua provided tax breaks to the bank, they were not enough to account for the above-market rates of the CD?

FORBES: Stanford's Victims Still In The Dark

The Vere Bird government welcomed an as-yet unknighted Mr Stanford to Antigua in the late 1980s after the authorities in the British overseas territory of Montserrat closed his offshore bank.

ECONOMIST: The Stanford affair