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…
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…
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…
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…
In the latest skirmish over the multi-million dollar proceeds of sale of the Patinack Farm properties once owned by Nathan Tinkler, liquidators Neil Cussen and David Mansfield have been ordered to deliver their time sheets to the Commissioner of Taxation (CoT). Following a directions hearing in the NSW Supreme Court on Monday, Justice Paul Brereton ordered the Deloitte duo to produce the time sheets and pay…
The deft management of conflict is a key skill for any registered liquidator and over in West Australia, Tony Woodings is negotiating a minefield of competing interests in the liquidation of the Bell Group of companies. Last week a decision was handed down in the Supreme Court of West Australia that illustrates how past undertakings can come back to bite after Woodings sought directions from…
When there’s $47 million in cash at stake, cross border insolvency issues and allegations that the disputed funds are proceeds of crime, it’s not surprising that the practitioners involved would fall out but the saga of Cedenco JV Australia/SK Foods Australia is one for the record books. Not only have liquidators John Sheahan and Ian Lock locked horns with receivers Mark Korda and Craig Shepherd during…
These days the term Disruption brings to mind new digital-based business models, demolishing the foundations of commerce with fiendishly clever and wholly amoral algorithms – but as the proceedings launched recently by the Department of Employment (DoE) against McGrathNicol demonstrate, disruption can be about new law, and the will to execute. Late last month the DoE filed a statement of claim in the Federal Court alleging breaches of…
As was recently reported by SiN, liquidator David Iannuzzi is girding his loins for a showdown next year with the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation (DCoT) but in the meantime the Veritas Advisory principal continues to throw himself into the rough and tumble of winning work. Obviously that means you win some and you lose some and Iannuzzi has certainly won his share in the past month, picking up about a dozen…
SiN hears Nick Combis and his former colleague at Vincents Peter Dinoris might be on the verge of a settlement with Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, which has been pressing for a judicial inquiry into their conduct as Trustees of the personal insolvency agreements (PIA) proffered by Bartercard co-founder and multi-millionaire Brian Hall. The Trustees’ statement of contentions shows that irrespective of what the bank thinks of how they…