Lawyers eye off luxury private assets of Evans Dixon boss David Evans
Legal representatives of disgruntled investors are threatening to target the luxury possessions of ex-Bombers chairman David Evans, which includes a $10 million helicopter and a $14 million mansion.
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Lawyers weighing up a class action against ex-Essendon chairman David Evans’ company are eyeing off private assets held by the firm’s directors.
A $10 million helicopter used by Mr Evans to ferry guests to his private golf club in country Victoria, and a $14 million mansion he bought on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast are among the assets which could be targeted.
The company has dismissed the claims as implausible, “scurrilous muckraking’’ and said there was absolutely no basis for a class action.
Shine Lawyer’s NSW class action principal Vicky Antzoulatos told the Herald Sun that “part of our investigations would certainly examine whether the class action should make claims against the directors personally.’’
“Part of that investigation … would include looking at what assets they held in their name,’’ she said.
Shine is investigating a potential $100 million litigation against the wealth management firm Evans Dixon after it lost more than 70 per cent of its value after floating on the stock market in May last year.
Clients have complained they accepted advice from the company’s financial planners to invest in a wholly-owned real estate subsidiary of Evans Dixon in the US, the URF, which has also plummeted in value.
A company spokeswoman said Shine had not updated its disclosure on its own website about its investigation for almost 12 months, and that they had not heard from the lawyers directly, as would be expected.
“Quite apart from there being, in our view, no reasonable basis for a client-based class action against Dixon Advisory, no plausible cause of action exists against any of our directors personally,’’ the spokeswoman said.
“So far as we are aware, no one has even made such a claim let alone one that might even remotely be plausible.
“We regard any suggestion of such a claim simply as scurrilous muckraking.”
She reiterated that the company believed there was no basis for a class action, and that Dixon Advisory continued to meet the best interest obligations in its advice.
Mr Evans has ploughed another $750,000 into the embattled business in recent weeks as it seeks to ride out the storm.
ASX disclosures reveal Jolimont Terrace Investments Pty Ltd — a company wholly owned by Mr Evans and his wife Sonya — bought one million Evans Dixon shares between August 29 and September 16.
The purchases came as the company’s share price inched up, from a low of 62c on August 20 to 80c today.
Mr Evans paid between 70c and 83c in his transactions, which occurred over nine separate days and totalled $746,149.
While the company’s share price has plummeted, the Herald Sun can reveal Mr Evans has made several significant purchases shortly after the stock was floated on the ASX in May 2018.
His $10 million AgustaWestland eight-seat helicopter arrived weeks after the sharemarket float, and was registered on July 11, 2018.
The Italian manufacturer Leopold sells the AW109SP for about $10 million, depending on its fit-out.
The helicopter is based at Essendon airport, and flight logs show it makes regular return journeys to Cathedral Lodge, Mr Evans’ private Greg Norman-designed golf course. The most recent flight was on Wednesday.
Civil Aviation Safety Authority records show the helicopter is operated by, and registered to, a company called Cathedral Aviation Pty Ltd, which lists its address as the Evans Dixon headquarters in Collins St, Melbourne.
ASIC records show Mr Evans is the sole director and secretary.
In September last year, Mr and Mrs Evans bought a stunning beachfront property on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland for $14 million, making an on-the-spot cash offer on first inspection
The Sunshine Beach sits on two blocks on Belmore Terrace at Sunshine Beach, south of Noosa. It features 41m of ocean frontage, six bathrooms, five bedrooms and a 23m pool.
The real estate agent who sold the home, Tom Offerman, told the Sunshine Coast Daily that he had invited an “interstate buyer’’ up for a preview inspection.
“They flew up, loved what they saw and signed an unconditional contract on the spot,’’ he said, when the property settled in October.
In an unusual move for Queensland, the name of the property owner’s is not listed on CoreLogic, the property search database, which instead notes “no information is available’’ as to ownership.
A title search shows the owner of the home is Sonya Evans — Mr Evans’ wife. The couple had sold their previous Noosa holiday home for $11 million several months earlier. The couple also own a historic home in Hawthorn.
Evans Dixon was born out of the merger of two wealth management companies in 2017 — Mr Evans’ firm Evans & Partners, and Alan Dixon’s Dixon Advisory.
Mr Dixon announced this week that he was relinquishing all executive duties with the company, following several months on personal leave.
He remains as a non-paid, non-executive director, and is still the company’s largest shareholder, with the most recent annual report showing he holds 39,122,625 shares, or 16.74 per cent of the company he co-founded.
Mr Evans owns 15,581,955 shares following his recent buy-up.
And two other former executives who quit the company also cashed out their shares in recent days.
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Christopher Brown, the former managing director of Dixon Advisory, quit the merged company in March 2018, before the float.
Tristan O’Connell, another long-time Dixon employee who became chief financial officer of the merged company, resigned for health reasons in July.
On September 24, two large shares trades were recorded.
One was for 3,624,571 shares, and the other for 3,624,572 shares.
Evans and Partners, an arm of Evans Dixon, was listed as the stockbroker for both the buyers and sellers.
The organised trade ensured the share price stayed steady. The identity of the purchaser of the shares is not known.
Originally published as Lawyers eye off luxury private assets of Evans Dixon boss David Evans
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