NAB colleagues happy to have Eric ‘Ecca’ Williamson on the job

Illustration: Rod Clement

How reassuring for NAB boss Andrew Thorburn to know that the head of risk in his business bank, Eric “Ecca” Williamson, has the full support and endorsement of his colleagues.

Chatroom records tendered to the Federal Court as part of Greg Medcraft’s jihad against interest-rate fixing show the love emanating from Ecca’s staff when he was running treasury.

We join the flow at 9.27am on March 10, 2011, as treasury’s David Page tells senior dealer Mathew Keeble he has “NFI” where the interest rate benchmark will be set.

Keeble: “Get Ecca on the job now!”

“Tell him how much risk/profits they have (or make it up) ... he’ll love it.”

Page: “I’m actually thinking that’s a great idea. If we’re stuck with Ecca we may as well use him to our advantage and get him kicking heads for us.

“One thing he is good at is being a prick!”

Keeble: “Haha yep … one trick pony but may as well get him dancing for us!”

Last year Ecca’s efforts earned him the gong for “best secondary offering” from industry mag FinanceAsia. Thorburn should only be proud.

Paper chase

While ANZ boss Shayne Elliott will be stoked to have one legal battle wrapped up with a win on fees in the High Court yesterday, it’s all systems go in defence of the legal action against the bank by sacked broker Angus Aitken.

ANZ’s lawyer, Ken Adams from Freehills, yesterday subpoenaed all docos relating to Aitken’s dismissal from Bell Potter, which will bear fruit in the NSW Supreme Court next month.

Today Aitken’s lawyer, Mark O’Brien, is expected to see phone, email and text message documents that he subpoenaed from Bell Potter returned to court.

Contrary to reports, O’Brien has not (yet) subpoenaed any info from ANZ, Elliott or his master tweeter media manager, Paul Edwards.

Meanwhile new CFO ­Michelle Jablko, the subject of Aitken’s now notorious note to clients on the appointment of ­investment bankers to corporate gigs, which Edwards questioned as sexist, is into her second week at the bank.

Happily, her desk is a subpoena-free zone.

A tough sale

Shayne Elliott’s predecessor in the top job at ANZ, Mike Smith, seems to know what he’s on about when he says overseas buyers at the top end of the property market appear to be sitting on their hands.

Mystery surrounds the sales campaign for Smith’s now redundant $15 million mansion, with pool and tennis court, on Toorak’s Hopetoun Road.

The pile, for which the Smiths paid almost $10m in late 2007, has been on the market since the start of the year in the hands of Kay & Burton director Ross Savas.

The banker, who still consults to ANZ and has an office at HQ, thought he had a deal a few months back with a Chinese richie, but the first application to the Foreign Investment Review Board for the sale was knocked back.

Apparently the paperwork wasn’t filled in right. At a cost of more than $100,000, the wannabe buyer is believed to have resubmitted the forms and the prestige home (which is right across the road from embattled Flagstaff boss Tony Burgess’s place) has disappeared from listings, but there has been no transfer.

Smith, meanwhile, is in the northern hemisphere for the summer, while his mansion sits idle and the pool turns green.

Out like Flynn

The great and the good gathered at Sydney’s Ivy Bar to farewell Free TV chief executive Julie “Eddie Everywhere” Flynn, a tireless and redoubtable champion for the industry after 15 years of service.

In opening remarks, Seven chief Tim Worner quipped that he was asked to describe Julie in three words. “Boutros Boutros-Ghali,” he said. While paying tribute to an “extraordinary” leader in a bruising high-octane industry where members don’t always see eye to eye, Worner joked that as the longest serving commercial TV CEO (three years and counting), he was “almost certainly next to go”.

Other attendees included former PM Tony Abbott, who recalled how he was interviewed by former journo Flynn 40 years ago. In what generated the biggest laugh of the night, he lamented that Flynn had told him back then how to form good relationships with the media. “I regret to say I haven’t always been able to take your advice,” Abbott joked.

Nine’s Hugh Marks, Ten’s Paul Anderson, former Ten CEO John McAlpine, former Seven boss David Leckie, Southern Cross’s Grant Blackley, Seven’s Bruce McWilliam, and Free TV chairman Harold Mitchell were also in attendance among an audience of more than 100.

Flynn’s seen off five Australian PMs and seven Comms ministers, Worner noted. “No easy feat,” he said in relation to the political world of free-to-air television. “If we were to list all of Julie’s achievements today, we would be here all day,” Worner said in relation to licence fee reductions, championing live and free sport and keeping the anti-siphoning list intact.

Video tributes were delivered by Seven proprietor Kerry Stokes, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, former News Corp chief Kim Williams, Prime chairman and former News chief John Hartigan, and former PM John Howard. Big boots to fill indeed.

Grain of truth

The secret late-Tuesday night plans by global grain giant ADM to sell off its 20 per cent stake in listed GrainCorp couldn’t have been worse timed for GrainCorp boss Mark Palmquist.

There was no avoiding his embarrassment or denying his ignorance when, just 15 hours after the abortive sale of ADM’s $300m-plus parcel of shares, Palmquist appeared centre stage in front of more than 300 grain traders, growers, dealers and brokers at the annual Australian Grains Industry conference at the Grand Hyatt in Melbourne.

Making matters worse, seated alongside Palmquist on stage was Andy Crane, boss of rival WA grain co-operative CBH, which GrainCorp had been manoeuvring to destabilise and partially buy earlier this year.

Yesterday morning ahead of their joint appearance, rumours swirled that CBH might now reverse that unfriendly behaviour and take the opportunity to snap up some of ADM’s sold stake in GrainCorp at a cut price.

Small wonder that as soon as the rather prickly talk session was over, Palmquist and Crane could be found huddled in a gold-wallpapered corner of the Hyatt talking intently about what they each knew about ADM’s intentions.

Not much, it seemed. Crane declared he was not a buyer, while Palmquist admitted he had no warning of ADM’s departure — and couldn’t get anyone from ADM to return his calls all yesterday.

Mariah M&A

James Packer’s teeny-weeny gold-sequined bikini-clad fiancee Mariah Carey might appear to be frolicking in the Arctic P’s hot tub without a care in the world, but underneath the diva is contemplating mergers and acquisitions.

In a just out interview with US youth culture mag Complex, Carey, worth more than $700m in her own right, says bringing two successful moguls together is difficult.

“We would like for it not to be a big thing but the reality is it has to be,” she says.

“Because there’s things that are specifically mine and he’s got huge friggin’ conglomerate stuff, and I’m not looking to take that from him.”

“So it has to be dealt with.”

Packer, worth $5 billion, probably agrees, having only just settled his late father Kerry Packer’s estate with his sister Gretel Packer — a process that took more than 10 years.

Meanwhile, was that Elle Macpherson and Uma Thurman’s ex, French-born, London-based hedge fund manager Arpad “Arki” Busson getting loose alongside Carey and Packer at a club on Capri earlier this week?

Retail billionaire Solomon Lew, whose super yacht Volpini has been parked on the other side of the Italian island to Packer’s icebreaker, appears to be giving the whole scene a wide berth.

Will Glasgow is on leave.