A Fall From Wealth; Nelson Bunker Hunt Talks Of Reasons and Regrets
Nelson Bunker Hunt. The name is synonymous with billionaire, but the man who sits surrounded by his family and his lawyers in a chill, windowless room in U.S. Tax Court here fears that he is close to broke.</br></br>The Internal Revenue Service says he and his wife, Caroline, owe the government $154,919,798.50 in unpaid taxes and interest for 1982. If it gets that, it will want hundreds of millions more for other years.</br></br>Hunt, who in 1980 was said to be worth $5 billion, already has filed for bankruptcy protection. He has told the court that his assets are worth only $258.8 million.</br></br>That's all that is left to pay his share of a $138 million judgment won by a subsidiary of the Peruvian government's silver monopoly that persuaded a New York jury that it was cheated when Hunt and others tried to corner the world silver market in 1979 and 1980; to settle a major class action suit brought by other silver investors; to settle another silver case brought by federal commodity regulators that could cost him millions; to pay the IRS if it wins, and to satisfy all his other creditors.</br></br>"It's virtually a wipe-out situation," a resigned Hunt said. "We don't really have much hope of coming out with anything. Just maybe a little piece... . That's about all."