Greenwood Village investment manager and former attorney Hendrik Jordaan has settled allegations that he inappropriately charged business and personal expenses to two investment funds backed by some of Denver’s wealthiest families, according to a news release from the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission on Friday.
Jordaan, a native of South Africa and former partner in the law firm Morrison Foerster, raised money for and then managed the One Thousand & One Voices Fund, which invested in sub-Saharan Africa, and the Families Legacy Fund, which invested in North America.
Jordaan operated and owned the two management companies investing the money in the two funds, which came primarily from wealthy families. The SEC alleges that from 2019 to 2022, Jordaan inappropriately charged the two investment funds for business expenses that, per the governing documents, were the obligation of his two management firms, or that represented personal expenses.
Questionable expenses included about $1.3 million for outsourced financial services, $214,000 for public relations services, and about $70,000 in legal fees to benefit the management companies, the SEC said in its administrative order. The One Thousand & One Voices Fund was charged $2.4 million and the Family Legacy Fund charged $160,000 for items with generic descriptions and lacking proper supporting documentation, the SEC said.
Jordaan took legitimate business trips, but also trips with his family where expenses were placed on the management company card and then billed to the investment funds, the SEC said.
“Jordaan charged the majority of his living and business expenses directly to One Thousand & One Voices Manager-issued corporate credit cards. He also provided One Thousand & One Voices Manager-issued corporate credit cards to his family members,” the SEC said in its complaint.
In determining penalties and repayments due to the funds, the SEC offset what it considered unauthorized expenses, plus interest, against what the funds owed the management companies. They roughly balanced each other.
Jordaan and his companies agreed to pay a civil money penalty of $250,000 to the SEC without admitting or denying any wrongdoing.
“I am pleased to wrap up this matter, particularly as there was no allegation of intentional misconduct, the SEC did not allege any net overpayment of funds, and there is no limitation to me continuing to operate in the securities industry uninterrupted,” Jordaan said in a statement issued through his attorney.
A large investment from John Coors, former CEO and chairman of CoorsTek, helped launch the One Thousand & One Voices Fund in 2013, and his support attracted the support of other prominent families.
Coors told The Wall Street Journal at the time that after paying for the schooling of Kenyan orphans for more than a decade, he realized those he had sponsored had no jobs available to them when they graduated. Education could only go so far without economic opportunity, and One Thousand & One Voices represented a free-market solution to address that problem.
The two funds are being wound down. In January of last year, Coors’ lawyers filed a separate action seeking to remove Jordaan as liquidator of the One Thousand & One Voices Fund. Coors did not respond to an interview request made through CoorsTek.
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