Government officials in Antigua have promised to work alongside American regulators to investigate their banking system, which is thought, by US officials, to be a regional centre for laundering money according to media reports.

Prime Minister Winston Baldwin Spencer said: “We are prepared to cooperate fully with the Americans in probing this whole affair ... the scandal has serious implications for the offshore banking sector.”

The acknowledgement comes after Antiguan officials seized control of Robert Stanford’s two banks in recent days and flies in the face of statements made last week by local bank regulators that the financial system in Antigua was absolutely clean.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission has accused Mr Stanford in a civil complaint of perpetrating an $8 billion fraud involving high-yielding certificates of deposit sold by an offshore bank in Antigua, although Mr Stanford has not been criminally charged.

Last week, the island nation’s Financial Services Regulatory Commission appointed two receivers to manage Mr Stanford’s offshore bank,
Stanford International Bank. The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank has assumed control of Mr Stanford’s local bank, the Bank of Antigua, which is used mostly by locals.

Local commentators said the Stanford scandal and the American and Antiguan response to it were part of a new direction for offshore banking.