"Many trusts invest their assets conservatively in stocks and bonds. But the Isle of Man trusts took their Wyly money and used it to establish a company in the Cayman Islands that would market offshore annuities to other investors. The result was Scottish Annuity & Life, which was set up and run by Mr. French, the Wyly lawyer, and included both Wyly brothers on its board from 1998 to 2000. Scottish Annuity, since renamed Scottish Re Group Ltd., was eventually taken public on the New York Stock Exchange. It has expanded into the business of reinsuring life-insurance policies issued by other companies and has $12 billion in assets." That jumped off the page at me. Looked it up and its traded on the pink sheets with a market capitalization of 12 million.
You're confusing assets with market-cap... This looks like a stock that blew up. Probably had exposure to real estate. http://www.scottishre.com/pdf/KBW_Conference_Sept2005.pdf
The Wyly situation is at least 5 years old. This was meant to divert attention from the SEC's attack on the public - the FOIA scandal http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/31/business/31wyly.html?src=mv
Also to divert attention from Rangel and the looming disaster in November for the Democrats - the Wyly bros. are big Pub backers.