Bank of Valletta may have reached a multi-million euro settlement with almost all the investors in a property fund that went belly up but three of those who declined the offer have decided to take the matter to court.

About 20 investors had not accepted the bank’s conditional offer in May, which amounted to 75c for every share in the La Valette Multi Manager Property Fund.

The bank had offered to buy back the shares at their market value and topped up the price to compensate for the fund’s disastrous performance.

However, three investors – Leonard Gauci, Teresa Cassar and Emanuel Zammit – this week filed court cases against La Valette Funds SICAV, fund managers Valletta Fund Management Ltd and fund custodians Bank of Valletta.

The court cases, signed by lawyer Ian Refalo, were also filed against the directors of La Valette Sicav, Salvinu Busuttil, outgoing bank chief executive Tonio Depasquale and John Ripard.

Meanwhile, Paul Bonello, managing director of Finco Trust, a financial services firm, said in a statement that hundreds of investors who filed complaints with the financial services regulator against the bank were anxiously waiting for the publication of the findings of two more investigations.

The Malta Financial Services Authority earlier this year published the first report of an investigation that found the bank guilty of breaching the property fund’s prospectus when it invested in high risk sub-funds.

Two other investigations into allegations of mis-selling and insider trading have not yet been concluded.

The MFSA announced last month that the insider dealing report would be published “imminently” and the third and final report would be published by year’s end.