yesterday with 18 counts of foreign currency exchange violation.

Phipps, 39, who faces trial in Supreme Court and was not required to enter a plea, was charged with obtaining more than US$24,000 by falsely stating on nine Bermuda Monetary Authority `FC' forms that he intended to spend the money abroad in New York.

He was further charged with nine counts of failing to give the US money back to the bank after not going abroad.

Crown counsel Ms Sharon Kenny said the alleged offences occurred between February and April, 1992.