Sale of Port Douglas Road land to go to super-scam victims
ASIC investigation
About $200m remains frozen by financial industry regulator the Australian Securities and Investments Commission as it aims to prosecute a range of people involved in the disappearance of millions of dollars in superannuation funds in a scandal intricately linked to a prime Port Douglas property up for sale.
The federal Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services heard last week more than 5000 people had lost an average of about $160,000 each in a “slick operation” involving the Shield Master Fund, whose former top executive Paul Chiodo was the developer behind the now scrapped $300m Port Douglas Fairmont Resort planned for an about 2ha vacant block at 71-85 Port Douglas Road.
The committee heard ASIC was working hard to return some money to people who had lost, in some cases, their life savings - which included selling off the Port Douglas Road block via receivers Alvarez & Marsal and commercial agents Colliers Cairns.
ASIC deputy chair Sarah Court told the hearing the liquidators were “continuing to do their work” and “we are continuing to take action to try to freeze the assets of any other both companies and individuals that we think may have been involved in this misconduct”.
ASIC was taking a host of different court actions and other activities against a range of people to retrieve as much money as possible from SMF.
“A number of those actions have been seeking to preserve or freeze assets to make them available, ultimately, to the investors,” she said.
ASIC chair Joseph Longo added: “Our major priority at the moment is trying to get money back for investors and hold people accountable.”
“I really want to be quite plain about this,” Mr Longo said.
“We're dealing with lawyers. They're all lawyered up.”
The committee heard ASIC was given orders from the Federal Court last June to freeze the assets of SMF and also get a “travel restraint” against Mr Chiodo so he could not leave the country.
Labor MP Tania Lawrence asked if several key players in the scandal, including Mr Chiodo, had been banned by ASIC from working in finance.
“Can they continue operating in the financial services sector?” she asked.
“Can they continue operating as company directors as of today?”
Ms Court replied: “I don't think that any of those… individuals that you've mentioned are able to continue in the financial services sector as we speak at the moment, for a range of different reasons.”
She said she understood the frustrations when ASIC was not able to stop people continuing to practise in finance while under investigation, and it could look further into “any changes, legislative or otherwise” that could put an end to that.
Committee chair Senator Deborah O’Neill then said: “I think that would be helpful, because there is this growing sense of frustration that you can just rip people off and walk away with the money.
“That's not palatable to Australians, whose hearts break when they hear stories about their mate down the road who's just lost their retirement or investment fund.”
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