Jacobus Everhardus Kellermann, alleged kingpin of the Belvedere Ponzi scheme, matriculated at Linden Hoerskool in Johannesburg in 1994 and graduated with a maths degree from Stellenbosch University in 1997. This puts him in his late 30s.
He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), the premier qualification in the investment sector.
To the outside world, Kellermann has all the trappings of a solid member of society. His wife, Tracy Ann Kellermann, has a PhD in pharmacology from the University of Cape Town. The daughter of Ken and Marieta Seaman, in her 2010 thesis she expressed extreme gratitude to her husband Cobus “for being a pillar of strength”.
Judging by his activity on Facebook and Pintrest, Kellermann is obsessive about classic cars. He has posted pictures of himself driving a red Ferrari, presumably his own.
Kellermann has been working in the investment sector in South Africa since 1998 when he joined Investec Asset Management where he spent three years, including a spell as the unit trust portfolio manager of its Value Fund. After leaving Investec he joined Ankh Analytic in 2001.
He established Cape Town-based Clarus Capital in 2009. Clarus is a sizeable business whose operations include seven of its own branded unit trusts into which South Africans have entrusted over R1.35bn of their savings. The unit trusts operate under the MET Collective Investments licence.
Kellermann is also listed as the fund manager of MET Collective Investment’s own MET Global Diversified Feeder Fund which he has run since 2009. It has assets of R196m.
His major operation, however, is in Mauritius. In an official submission to the Mauritian Financial Services Commission, Kellerman is listed as the 50% owner of RDL Management. His Irish business partner David Cosgrove owns the other half.
RDL is a $500m investment management and advice arm of Belvedere Management Limited. Cosgrove is described as the director of the firm and Kellermann as the portfolio manager of its funds.
The return states that apart from RDL, “total group assets under administration, management and advisory is circa $16.5bn (R200bn).”
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