Fat finger syndrome behind ANZ wind up error

The erroneous listing showing ANZ as being subject to wind up proceedings  

WELL you wouldn't have wanted to be a hung over fund manager yesterday morning, logging on to check the state of the portfolio after a big night out.

If you had then you might've seen that the daily insolvency notices included a listing for the ANZ Bank. Further, the listing showed that the bank was being wound up by the tax office.

According to the notice ANZ was subject to wind up proceedings brought by Gadens Lawyers on behalf of the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation (DCoT).

Imagine the potential reaction of the crapulous fundie if he or she was in charge of a serious parcel of ANZ stock. In their vulnerable state they might've panicked. A precipitous share price plunge could've been accidentally engineered.

Fortunately Insolvency Notices publisher Louttit & Associates realised that Gadens had mistakenly entered ANZ's Australian Company Number (ACN) and was quick to act.

"Correction - AMENDED Insolvency Notices Alert 3 March 2016," read the follow up email.

Asset freezing proceedings dismissed by consent

Jarrod Siorecki: Obtained
freezing orders against a
former director. 

Insolvency Guardian managing director Jarrod Siorecki has chosen not to pursue asset freezing orders against the former director of Insolvency Guardian Melbourne.

Siorecki sought an urgent ex-parte hearing before Justice James Edelman late on Monday, February 8, 2016 and was granted freezing orders the following day. But on March 11, the judge ordered the proceedings be dismissed by consent.

Initially Justice Edelman had made orders against Philip Anthony Carlei, formerly Insolvency Guardian Melbourne's director and Zuppa Soup Kitchens Pty Ltd, a company controlled by Carlei, freezing assets to the value of $400,000. 

It should be noted that at the time of the application Carlei had not had an opportunity to respond to Siorecki's allegations, which are outlined in a judgment attached to the orders. 

Carlei's Linked In profile lists his most recent employment as being an area manager for Baker's Delight. There are also references to stints at RSM Bird Cameron and Hall Chadwick but no mention of Insolvency Guardian Melbourne.

Former Insolvency Guardian Melbourne
director Phil Carlei

Nor were the allegations tested. SiN heard from Victorian sources that Carlei was overseas. 

Carlei was a contractor who began working as the sole representative of Insolvency Guardian Melbourne in February, 2014.

In January 2015 he was made a director of Insolvency Guardian Melbourne. From that point he was to be paid 50 per cent of the fees charged by Insolvency Guardian to all clients he introduced to the organisation. Then in mid-December 2015 Carlei told Siorecki that he intended to resign.

The announcement came about a week after Siorecki decided - on December 9 - that Insolvency Guardian Melbourne would cease trading because: "The Melbourne office did not reap the same financial rewards as the Brisbane office".

PPB Fees - Oswal's expert unwilling to condemn

Pankaj and Radhika Oswal

READ in their entirety, expert witness reports can be turgid affairs. Eye-glazing repetition. Incessant referencing of Acts and Codes. Footnotes even. But when a report's author is cross-examined in open court and the minutiae of their conclusions surveyed, a more engaging narrative may emerge.

Barry Raymond Cooke is one such expert. Cooke was engaged by Pankaj Oswal to produce expert witness reports about PPB Advisory's handling of the receivership of Oswal's Burrup Fertilisers Group (BFG).

In the bitter litigation that's played out between BFG founder Oswal, his lender ANZ Bank and PPB, the Dubai-based fertiliser tycoon has lined up PPB partners Ian Carson, Simon Theobald and David McEvoy for special retribution, motivated by what Oswal claims was flagrant overcharging during the 13 months they were receivers.

Oswal is out for blood. In his statement of relief filed on 1 April 2015, he sought orders which would effectively see Carson, McEvoy and Theobald disqualified from acting as official liquidators or liquidators for seven years.

The alleged excesses are well catalogued. Wives, children and partners accompanying PPB staff as they travelled each week from Melbourne to Perth. Alleged gross inflation of costs - Oswal and his wife Radhika claim the receivers charged almost $20,000 to fill out a form - reclassifying work so that it would be paid for by Burrup Fertilisers Pty Ltd (BFPL), rather than by ANZ or the receivers themselves.

The appointment lasted just 13 months and in that time PPB and legal advisers Herbert Smith Freehills and Minter Ellison reportedly billed almost $34 million. One of the receivers, Melbourne-based partner Carson, has even admitted that things could've been done better, though PPB insists it has at all times acted within the law and in accordance with the applicable professional standards.

Radhika wins minor round against PPB

A Fairline Squadron, similar to the one PPB is
worried will rot at its mooring. 

YOU'D think PPB Advisory's boys on the Burrup Fertilisers Pty Ltd (BFPL) receivership might be a little miffed.

On December 22, just a week after their big win in the Supreme Court of Victoria, Federal Court judge Justice Neil Walter McKerracher dismissed their application seeking to be appointed receivers to a Fairline Squadron 74, purportedly owned by the wife of absent fertiliser mogul Pankaj Oswal. And that decision is going to cost. (Read the Judgement)

Ed Hardy boss's bankruptcy boo boo

Gary Berman with Tara Reid.
Photo: Cameron Laird

BAD fashion transcends borders, which is why SiN can report on the bankrupting of one-time Melbourne clothing entrepreneur Gary Michael Berman.

Berman is the man who brought the Ed Hardy clothing brand to Australia. 

While this was not a crime, Federal Magistrate Daniel O’Dwyer recently pointed out that making an incorrect entry in a debtor's petition potentially is. 

“The details provided in a Debtor’s Petition are required to be accurate,” and “.…. should the requisite declaration that the details are correct made in support of the application prove to be false there is the potential of a criminal sanction of imprisonment for 12 months,” O”Dwyer wrote in his December 15, 2011 judgement.

O'Dwyer was commenting on the response Berman made to question 33 of his debtor's petition, which the former Ernst & Young accountant filed on May 17, 2011, almost 12 months after his stable of Ed Hardy outlets closed its doors. Question 33 requires a debtor to list transfers of assets and gifts made in the preceding five years.