Only three out of nearly 2,000 investors have come forward to claim a share of nearly $2 million due to them in windfall cash from litigation and tax refunds held in an investment fund that is being wound up, the High Court heard. Some 485 individuals and 1,429 corporate entities are entitled to payouts from the windfall cash. Of these, one in seven is due sums of more than $250 with the rest entitled to lower amounts.The trustee of the fund moved two weeks ago to ask the High Court to allow $1,964,141 (€1,712,872) be lodged in court to which the investors could then apply for payment. The court heard there had been extensive steps over many years to contact eligible investors but with very little response.Two weeks ago the court ordered that certain steps be taken to notify investors of the application to lodge the funds to court. These included advertisements in the Irish Independent and Wall Street Journal and on the trustee website, as well as notifying all investors by post and/or email.The trustee is State Street Custodial Services (Ireland) Ltd with a registered office in Dublin and Putnam World Trust, an umbrella unit trust which appointed State Street to act as trustee in February 2000. On Thursday, Stephen Brady, for the trustee, told Judge Brian Cregan that just three investors had come forward and none had appeared in court for this application.The judge said he had been astounded to hear on the previous occasion that so few had come forward despite various efforts by the trustee over 13 years to contact them. He was “even more astounded now” to hear only three had since come forward.He said he was satisfied to make the order that the funds be lodged in to the court office in euro at the prevailing exchange rate.Investors could be notified by post or email again or by advertisement on the trustee website but not in the newspapers, which, Brady said, was rather expensive and would be a drain on the funds.As an umbrella trust, the court heard the trust has a number of sub-funds. Eleven of these funds have authorisations which have yet to be revoked by the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI); fifteen previously authorised funds have had their authorisations revoked.Due to class action litigation and/or tax reclaims arising before the appointment of new fund manager, Carne, money had been received into certain of the revoked funds. These are due to close to 2,000 previous investors. Out of 485 individuals involved, 138 are due more than $250 while 289 are due less than that figure. Of 1,429 corporate entities, 1,291 are due less than $250 and 138 are due more than that.