SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
             Washington, D.C.

             Litigation Release No.   15709    / April  20, 1998

             SEC  v.  Banner  Fund International, Civil Action No. 94-342
             (EGS) ( D.D.C.)

             The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that
             on April 15, 1998, The Honorable Emmet Sullivan, United
             States District Judge for the District of Columbia, granted
             the Commission's motion for default judgment against  relief
             defendants Precision Trust, Automotive Concepts (Trust),
             Academy Equities Trust, Hermes Leasing Trust and Fulfillment
             Center Trust,  and ordered them to disgorge a total of
             $760,500, plus  prejudgment interest of $329,822.74.  The
             Court found that these sums represented proceeds from the
             fraud perpetrated on thousands of United States investors by
             defendants Banner Fund International, Swiss Trade & Commerce
             Limited Trust, Lloyd Winburn and Eddy Blackwell,  which the
             relief defendants held in constructive trust for the benefit
             of the defrauded investors.
             In two prior rulings, the Court had ordered Banner Fund,
             Swiss Trade, Winburn and Blackwell to disgorge $6.5 million
             they raised from investors, plus prejudgment interest.

              From late 1992 through 1994, defendants Winburn and
             Blackwell, both United States citizens operating first out
             of Aruba and later from Belize, offered and sold investments
             in the Banner Fund International Offshore Arbitrage
             Leveraging Program, which they advertised as an opportunity
             for the "little guy" to take advantage of "phenomenal"
             opportunities in the financial markets.  Through the vehicle
             of Banner Fund, under the management of Swiss Trade, Winburn
             and Blackwell claimed that investors' funds would be
             leveraged into large profits with little or no room for
             loss.  In fact, after raising at least $6.5 million from
             mailings targeted primarily at unsophisticated investors
             with small amounts of capital to invest, defendants failed
             to engage in any leverage or arbitrage activity, but instead
             spent the money on real estate and a shrimp farm in Belize,
             and on  trusts in the United States engaged in lending money
             to defendants' relatives and friends.  The trusts were named
             as relief defendants in an amended complaint filed September
             12, 1997.

             For further information, see Litigation Release Nos. 15689,
             15311.