The liquidators of Ross Asset Management (RAM) are in talks with three former investors over about $NZ3.8 million ($A3.55 million) of payments they received in the two years leading up to the group’s collapse last year.

PwC’s John Fisk and David Bridgman are looking at transactions they might be able to reverse as they seek to claw back as much of the $NZ100m to $NZ115m that was lost in the fraudulent scheme for some 1,200 investors.

If the claim against the three succeeds they will likely seek more repayments.

They have written to three RAM investors requesting the money be repaid, and “are in discussions with or seeking further information from all three recipients as a result of our demands”, they said in their second liquidator’s report.

“If no suitable resolutions can be reached we intend to issue notices to have the payments set aside and then take steps to recover the monies from those recipients,” they said.

This week, David Ross’s lawyer indicated the convicted fraudster plans to appeal the 10-year 10-month jail sentence as manifestly excessive. His record sentence, delivered last month, included a five-year five-month non-parole period.

Ross Asset Management’s assets were frozen and receivers appointed last year by the Financial Markets Authority after the watchdog received complaints about delayed or non-payment of investor funds. Ross wasn’t available in the early days of the investigation due to his hospitalisation under the Mental Health Act.

Mr Fisk and Mr Bridgman said they had not found any evidence that anyone other than David Ross was a party to the fraud.

Last month, the High Court in Wellington extended asset preservation orders over the assets of Ross, RAM and related entities to include DRG Ross Family Trust, also known as the David Robert Gilmour Ross Family Trust.

Mr Fisk and Mr Bridgman were appointed to preserve the assets of the Ross family and related trusts as part of the wider investigation into Ross Asset Management, which is regarded as a Ponzi scheme.