The legal cost to liquidate Bernie Madoff & Co. is piling up, consuming roughly 2.3% of all monies recovered to date.  In his latest fee request, trustee Irving Picard is seeking approval for $43.2 million for 4 months' work by himself and his Baker & Hostetler partners and associates. 

All told, Mr. Picard has submitted bills totaling $175.5 million, or 2.3% to recover $7.6 billion.  $7.2bn of that total represents the settlement Mr. Picard and U.S. prosecutors reached in December with the estate of Jeffry Picower, a Madoff investor who died in 2009.  Mr. Picard, who has filed over 1,000 suits seeking money for the Madoff's investors, said in February he was halfway to recovering the $20 billion in principal lost when Bernie was arrested in 2008. 

Yet, in Monday's court filing, he lowered the recovery by $2.4 billion - the difference being the amount of forfeited funds held by the U.S. Attorney, which is being disputed in court.  It's now up to the bankruptcy judge to approve or disapprove the request.

Picard’s law firm said it spent 7,086 hours on investigations at a cost of $3.1 million from 10/1/10 to 1/31/11.  Administration consumed 7,033 hours, and cost $2.1 million.  The trustee’s case against JPMorgan Chase took 1,971 hours, while a case against the owners of the New York Mets required 1,660 hours, and customer claims took 4,837 hours, according to the filing. 

The main case is Securities Investor Protection Corp. v. Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, 08-ap-1789, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).   [Bloomberg, 4/20]