Litigation

Neolido fraud: Leigh paid $100k to secured creditor

Court documents obtained by Sydney Insolvency News reveal that ex-PPB Advisory (PPBA) partner David Leigh paid $100,000 to a secured creditor out of a total $800,000 PPBA alleges he fraudulently misappropriated from the liquidation account of Neolido Holdings. According to an application for freezing orders filed by lawyers for PPBA last week, Leigh was questioned about the missing monies on Tuesday February 22 by PPBA Queensland…


Liq’s Bid to restrain examination evidence refused

The ongoing examination into the affairs of Australia’s largest private precious metals smelter continues to provide ore for SiN’s mill. As has been previously reported, the companies at the heart of this affair were served by the ATO with a $200 million plus bill for unpaid GST and penalties back in 2017 and are contesting it every inch of the way in the courts. That…


Robinson’s Reed blitz could attract FEG attention

PPBA partner Mark Robinson has been running hard on the Reed Constructions case these last five and half years so SiN took a look at the most recent statement of accounts and minutes of meetings to see what he’s been getting for his efforts. Backed with funds from Pat Maloney’s Litigation Capital Management, Robinson has been pursuing an insolvent trading claim against two Reed directors, Geoff Reed and Derry Hill, who…


Ex-mates to go toe to toe over failed partnership

It’s four years since Steve Kugel severed his association with Anthony Warner and walked out of their lucrative partnership CRS Warner-Kugel. Although the blood’s all bad the two liquidators will be compelled to occupy the same relatively confined space when Kugel’s case against Warner is heard in the NSW Supreme Court. The hearing was due to kick off this week but an amended statement of claim filed by Kugel though…


Invalid administrator may be chased over “trespass”

This sounds like one for the lit funders’ slide rule – a suspended ASX shell, millions in dissipated shareholder capital, the same law firm allegedly acting for both parties in a merger and a voluntary administrator punted after a judge ruled his appointment was invalid. It was back in August 2016 that a court ruled that Mackay Goodwin’s Domenic Calabretta had been invalidly appointed voluntary administrator of…


SiN 2017 – the Year in Review

The year is done, Christmas is come and for SiN it is time to replenish the reservoir of curiosity ahead of what promises to be a fascinating 2018. From next year the Insolvency Law Reform Act (ILRA) will be in full swing. Insolvency practitioners will face a world where creditors will have expanded powers. Appointees will need to get used to being replaced. Courts too…


PPBA steams as preference hold out opts for VA

SiN opens by apologising for the crime of coincidence which sees us writing about Jamieson Louttit for the second time this week. The coincidence can be explained by pointing to the small size of the Australian insolvency profession. Practitioners can’t help but cross paths on rival appointments and today’s tale doesn’t deal solely with the Pitt Street principal of Louttit & Associates. PPB Advisory’s (PPBA) Mark Robinson…


Administrator in the middle of Veriluma shell game

The former president of Yemen once described ruling the strife-torn Arab nation as like “dancing on the heads of snakes”. This week Ali Abdullah Saleh was assassinated by his former allies, who before becoming false friends of convenience had been the most reliable of enemies. Saleh’s fate got SiN wondering whether Jamieson Louttit may have developed a few dance steps of his own since last month when…


PwC pair lose to Pitchers duo in Pluton DoCA fight

The arm wrestle over $835,021.94 paid into a deed of company arrangement (DoCA) has come to a possible conclusion in the West Australian Supreme Court of Appeal with a judge overturning an earlier decision of the WA Supreme Court. As a result Pitcher Partners’ Bryan Hughes and Daniel Bredenkamp as receivers and managers of Pluton Resources have been found to be entitled to the funds ahead of…


Litigation funder blames Bentleys pair for delay

Listening to the proceedings in Coope Litigation Management (CLM) V Octaviar this week, SiN couldn’t but ponder whether the business of bankrolling litigation might not provide more than sufficient grist for even reality television’s mill. Funding claims oxygenates the flames and on Monday CLM’s arsonist-in-chief Patrick Coope spent much of the day in the witness box at the NSW Supreme Court, hosing down insinuatory spot fires. These were started by…