Off Circular Quay, there’s a boat called Kokomo.
That’s where you wanna go, to get away from it all.
And get away from it all they did, with Walker Corporation’s finance and treasury director Adam Patterson squiring representatives from MinterEllison and Bank of Queensland on a perfect day on the harbour #syndicatedlending.
Which brings us to the point – when did LinkedIn become Facebook?
Probably ages ago to be honest, and yeah, we’re being nitpicky, and kudos to Yasmin Siely and the team at Bank of Queensland for growing their syndicated lending portfolio by more than $1bn, but posting about the importance of culture while swanning about Sydney Harbour is enough to make the peons in the back office choke on their foie gras.
But as Ms Siely reflects: “If we don’t have clients to service we really don’t have anything.’’
If a tree falls in a forest, does anyone hear it? And if a client takes you out on a boat ride on Sydney Harbour and you don’t post to social media thanking them, did it really happen? Nope.
PS – the boat is actually Kokomo II, but that didn’t fit the gag.
Wright wrong
Sayers Group chief executive and chief investment officer James Wright dusted off the old time machine for his column in the Fin Review this week, urging shareholders with a bent for copper to take a lot at OZ Minerals and Newcrest.
Look we get it – half the time we’re flat out keeping on top of the latest share price for Adelaide Steamship Company, not to mention Foster’s.
But just like those two, OZ and Newcrest don’t actually exist anymore.
In the case of Newcrest, whose shareholders only voted to fold the company into Newmont in October, it’s understandable. Maybe the column had been in the bottom drawer for a while.
But OZ hasn’t existed since May!
It’s a bit of a deviation from the Sayers Group mission statement that “we don’t just do things better, we do better things’’. Then again, later on there’s a call for “progress over perfection’’ so perhaps the occasional slip-up is to be expected.
Wright sent us a missive explaining that the article was written “some time ago”, with OZ and Newcrest included in the first draft.
“These were removed after review but there was an issue with the version control and the AFR got a version with both names included.’’
We were hoping to get a well-spun version of events from Sayers Group partner, radio host and “brand whisperer” Russel Howcroft about the Wright column – maybe next time.
The Fin might want to have a squiz at its own processes in that matter, given its team should be well across the disappearance of two of Australia’s major mining firms in the past year.
The high net worths backing the Sayers venture into wealth management – Lindsay Fox and son David, Seek founder Andrew Bassett, Helloworld Travel owner and Liberal Party heavy Andrew Burnes and Jayco Caravans owner Gerry Ryan – are also hopefully getting more up-to-date advice.
Meanwhile boss and founder Luke Sayers will no doubt be looking to put the year behind him, having copped a brutal Senate grilling over his role as former head of PwC in October.
As for former OZ boss Andrew Cole, we continue to be delighted by his LinkedIn profile, which lists his current job title as “Gone Fishing’’.
His job description is “a reflective sabbatical’’, further described as “unemployed and loving it (for now)’’.
No whispers yet as to Cole’s next move, but we hear he’s not champing at the bit to dive back into a chief executive role.
In the meantime, hopefully the fish are biting.
High flyers
A private jet charter company offering services to celebrity VIPs and “private individuals” says one of their clients owes them a cool $80,000 after failing to pay for three separate chartered services. Federal Court documents show the Australian Corporate Jet Centres (ACJC) company, which operates out of Melbourne’s Essendon Fields – AKA Victoria’s billionaire landing strip – has applied to wind up Cepta Group Pty Ltd.
ACJC say the firm has failed to pay them nearly $80,000 – which included chartering the jets and paying for crew accommodation – for three separate trips taken this year.
According to an invoice, lodged with the court documents, Cepta Group chartered some swanky jets for these trips to Sydney and the Gold Coast.
They included a Cessna Citation Ultra VH-LHU, which carries seven passengers and sports white leather seats, and a Bombardier Learjet 45 VH-LJX.
ACJC chief Sam Iliades declined to comment for this story.
But after Margin Call’s interest was piqued at the sight of “jet” on a court list, we couldn’t stop.
Sources and some sleuthing led us to discover a former director of Cepta Group Pty Ltd, Danny Topperberg, is believed to have been aboard all three flights which we hear were approved by Cepta Holdings CEO Sidney Wheatley.
According to its website Cepta Holdings is a “boutique corporate finance and advisory firm”, and its CEO is Mr Wheatley who is “currently the CIO for the private office of His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Salman Al-Khalifa in the Kingdom of Bahrain”.
Mr Topperberg and Cepta Holdings did not respond to requests for comment on the story.
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Tink turns opaque on finance transparency
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