John Lindholm is not a name one associates with controversy. A few years short of Ferrier Hodgson’s compulsory retirement age, the Melbourne office’s straight-talking chief has a sound record. But circumstance thrusts contention upon unlikely bearers and Lindholm is currently dallying with unwelcome publicity thanks to his role as administrator of failed vocational education group Australian Careers Network (ACN) Group; his trading of Showgirls Bar…
If any insolvency practitioner remains uncertain as to the intentions of the Department of Employment’s (DoE) Active Creditor Unit (ACU), contemplate the plight of dVT Group’s Riad Tayeh, whose role as receiver of Delnote Constructions has recently been the subject of public examinations in the NSW Supreme Court. Tayeh and dVT colleague David Solomons were appointed receivers of the commercial concreter in November 2014. The appointor was Hermes…
HELL hath no fury like a banker denied the voluntary administrator (VA) of his choice, as Grant Thornton’s Paul Billingham discovered during his truncated tenure as VA of Arrium. As a result of accepting the appointment, SiN understands at least four receiverships were lopped from GT’s advisory division in a day. The axe was wielded by Westpac’s restructuring chief Gwyn Morgan, who wanted good mate Peter Andersen’s firm McGrathNicol…
Liquidators can on occasion err in pursuit of a preference but incorrectly defining insolvency and testifying as one’s own expert witness? The cake has well and truly been taken. Or at least it has if you accept the conclusions of the Federal Court’s Justice Jim Edelman In the matter of FPJ Group Pty Ltd (In Liquidation). His honour’s judgement deals with a $153,554.00 claim for…
THE politically-charged liquidation of Bruck Textile Technologies (BTT) has catapulted HLB Man Judd partners Andrew Needham and Barry Taylor to number four on the list of Assetless Administration Fund (AAF) recipients. Since December 2014 Needham and Taylor have received $499,647.50 in AAF monies to fund their investigations into BTT’s controversial restructure, which took place prior to their appointment by creditors voluntary liquidation on July 11, 2014. Half…
ASIC and the Department of Employment’s (DoE) Active Creditor Program are for the first time simultaneously funding liquidators in a bid to unpick the 2014 restructure of Bruck Textiles Technologies (BTT). BTT was wound up by a creditors voluntary liquidation (CVL) initiated by its shareholder, Australian Textile Group (ATG) on July 11, 2014. HLB Man Judd’s Andrew Needham and Barry Taylor were appointed joint liquidators. A day…
AN application to appoint PPB Advisory’s Steve Parbery special purpose liquidator (SPL) of Queensland Nickel (QN) has been lodged in the Federal Court but the stricken nickel firm’s general purpose liquidators (GPLs) are yet to declare whether they will consent to or contest the move. Quentin Olde, one of four FTI Consulting partners formerly appointed GPLs to QN on April 27 told SiN yesterday that the…
THE changes to insolvency mooted in the Federal Government’s Innovation Statement provide an ideal opportunity for insolvency practitioners to host seminars. There the invited can hear the pros and cons debated then opine at length during the drink and nibbles that invariably follow. Last week Schon Condon, James McPherson and the rest of the Condon Associates team were at it, packing their conference room on…
ORDERS freezing the assets of the former director of Insolvency Guardian Melbourne have been dismissed. In the Federal Court last week Justice James Edelman ordered that the proceedings brought against Phil Carlei by Insolvency Guardian principal Jarrod Siorecki be dismissed by consent. There were no orders as to costs. Neither Carlei or Siorecki responded to requests for comment. The orders bring to an end an action…
IT was fortuitous that no vases were present in the Ming Room at 3 Spring Street last Friday because the unsecureds in attendance were fit to topple a dynasty. When they learned that the patriarch had had a seizure, they laughed. When the contents of his doctor’s certificate were divulged, derision and cynicisms were elicited. When told he was too ill front, they overthrew his…