Soup heir is hopeful his cup runneth over

ONE of the heirs to the Campbells Soup fortune, George Strawbridge, is expected to turn up at today’s Melbourne Cup at Flemington.

An American, whose grandfather invented condensed soup, Strawbridge is a co-owner of British stallion Gatewood, which is running in the big race under the guiding hand of top trainer John Gosden.

Gosden is definitely at the carnival — Margin Call spotted him in the Emirates enclosure on Saturday.

Gatewood’s other owner is OTI Racing, the bloodstock business run by Terry Henderson and former Test cricketer Simon O’Donnell.

It’s not Gatewood’s first visit to Australia — he was here in 2012, winning the Geelong Cup, but was sent back to England in August last year after a lean spell.

OTI has no fewer than four horses in the big race but racing manager Shayne Driscoll isn’t counting on collecting the cup.

“They’re all pretty long shots but you only need one to win,” he said.

Out in the paddock

UNLIKELY to show up is Jennifer Hawkins, who despite being the face of Myer won’t be fronting the department store’s teepee on one of the biggest media days of the year. Nonetheless, Myer insists she’s not being eased out in a face-off with Adelaide actress Tilda Cobham-Hervey, who features in the chain’s new TV ads.

Trouper J-Hawk, who still has two years to run on her contract, was front and centre for shake and fake duties alongside CEO Bernie Brookes on Derby Day and apparently will be back on Thursday, Oaks Day.

On Saturday, she’s unveiling Myer’s Melbourne Christmas windows. Now there’s glamour.

Morris zooms in

COMPUTERSHARE founder, island owner and pub baron Chris Morris is swapping his bar stool for the head of the board table, yet again. If everything goes as planned, he’ll be the chairman of three publicly listed companies at the same time when CCTV outfit DTI Group floats in December.

The company, which runs security cameras on buses and trains, has lodged a prospectus to raise just $2 million in a compliance listing organised by part-owner Pendulum Capital and underwritten by Baillieu Holst.

Morris, who is also chairman of Computershare and Smart Parking, owns 14.7 per cent of DTI, which will be diluted to 13.5 per cent after the IPO.

The company’s forecasting a profit of $2.58m in 2015, up from $1.12m this year. Listing will give DTI the ability to go to the market and raise money to buy other operators, although it doesn’t have any targets as yet.

Jitto on a leash

WHILE it’s all go for Morris, the corporate watchdog has kyboshed Jitto Arulampalam’s dreams of adding a second listed directorship to his roster — at least for the moment.

Arulampalam, who is executive chairman of Progen Pharmaceuticals, was planning on becoming executive director of Viculus, a shell into which it is proposed to back-door list Euro Petroleum.

Despite the name, Euro Petroleum has nothing to do with Europe or Petroleum — instead, it’s planning to look for graphite in Sri Lanka.

It’s somewhat reminiscent of Arulampalam’s last venture, Fortis Mining, aka Kazakhstan Potash Corporation, which is, er, looking for potash in Kazakhstan.

Indeed, the Viculus prospectus reunites some of the old gang from Fortis, including Madame Freada Cheung, who now runs KPC. Fortis also ran into strife with ASIC, which at one point stopped the company’s prospectus on fears Madame Cheung had an undisclosed interest in the potash fields.

Last week, ASIC slapped an interim stop order on the Viculus prospectus, banning the fundraising for the time being.

Correction

FRIDAY’S Margin Call incorrectly identified the radio station being sued by PR guru Charlie Goldsmith as Triple M. It is Triple R. Triple R is a community broadcaster; Triple M is owned by Southern Cross Media, which tries to make a profit even if it isn’t very good at it.