---
category: BCCI Scandal
created: 2026-09-21
location: Little Rock, Arkansas
summary: Stephens Inc. officer present at the November 1977 Little Rock meeting with
  BCCI, later chairman of Worthen Bank, which lent the 1992 Clinton campaign 3.5 million
  dollars.
tags:
- Person
- CurtBradbury
- StephensInc
- WorthenBank
- BCCI
- BillClinton
- CampaignFinance
updated: 2026-09-21
---

Curt Bradbury is a [Little Rock](/places/little-rock-arkansas/) banker who spent his career with the firms of [Jackson Stephens](/people/jackson-stephens/).

On November 9, 1977, as an employee of [Stephens Inc.](/organizations/stephens-inc/), he sat with Stephens and [Bert Lance](/people/bert-lance/) in Little Rock opposite Abdus Sami of the [Bank of Credit and Commerce International](/organizations/bank-of-credit-and-commerce-international/). The subject was Lance's [National Bank of Georgia](/organizations/national-bank-of-georgia/). "Stephens and Bradbury allegedly recommended that BCCI purchase FGB stock or recommend the stock to its clients," two reporters wrote of [Financial General Bankshares](/organizations/financial-general-bankshares/), of which Stephens Inc. held 4.9 percent. Within two months four clients of the bank had bought into the company through an account at Stephens Inc.[^1]

In April 1985 [Worthen Bank](/organizations/worthen-bank/) lost 52 million dollars of [Arkansas](/places/arkansas/) state money in the failure of Bevill, Bresler and Schulman. Stephens Inc. underwrote a 35 million dollar stock issue, and Bradbury took charge of the bank. As its chairman in March 1992 he arranged a line of credit of 3.5 million dollars for the presidential campaign of [Bill Clinton](/people/bill-clinton/), of which about 3 million was drawn and repaid. The campaign kept its federal election funds on deposit at the bank. With [Mack McLarty](/people/mack-mclarty/) he organized Little Rock fundraisers that brought in 2 million dollars, and he gave 10,000 dollars to the [Democratic Party](/organizations/democratic-party/). Another account names the campaign's finance officer, David Watkins, as the man who arranged the loan, and puts it at 3.9 million dollars in eleven installments.[^2][^3]

[^1]: Truell, Peter, and Larry Gurwin. *False Profits: The Inside Story of BCCI, the World's Most Corrupt Financial Empire*. Houghton Mifflin, 1992; Financial General Bankshares, Inc. v. Metzger, 523 F. Supp. 744 (D.D.C. 1981).
[^2]: "Meet The Family That Bankrolled Clinton," *The Seattle Times,* January 31, 1993; "15 Years in Review," *Arkansas Business.*
[^3]: Morris, Roger. *Partners in Power: The Clintons and Their America*. Henry Holt, 1996.