Cornish manager to pay 10c in the dollar

Press, 18 September 1976, Page 15

Cornish manager to pay 10c in the dollar

•PA Wellington • An initial payment of 10c jin the dollar is to be made 1 before Christmas to more than 6700 investors, and other unsecured creditors in jthe Cornish groups of companies. Amounting to about $1,350,000, this first distribution to unsecured creditors will be followed by others in due course, the statutory manager of Cornish Investments, Ltd (Mr IL W. Stannard) says. Further payments depend on the successful realisation of group assets, he says. I Payments to secured creditors, amounting to about S2M have been made in accordance with the priorities set by the Cornish ; Companies Management Act, 1974. Unsecured creditors had, in effect, a very large in-

vestment in the World Trade Centre complex in Wellington because of the comI aratively small amount of mortgage money to be repaid on it, Mr Stannard says. “This complex is the group’s largest single asset and represents about onethird of the creditors’ claims. “Unfortunately, the economic climate currently militates against the possibility of making a satisfactory realisation of this major asset. “While strenuous efforts have been made both in New Zealand, and overseas to fund a buyer, today’s market is no better than when it was originally offered for sale 20 months ago. “Because of this, and the complexity of ordering the affairs of the group, it has to be faced that it will be a

; number of years before the jwinding-up can be comipleted, and final distributions made to investors, and other (unsecured creditors. i “Nevertheless, orderly realisations of parts of the group other than the World Trade Centre are progressively being made as circumstances allow,” Mr Stannard says. Mr Stannard will report, in the near future, to the Minister of Justice (Mr Thomson) on detailed aspects of his administration o' the Cornish group. In his preliminary report to the minister a year ago, Mr Stannard noted that total liabilities were $17.9M at the date of his appointment. The liabilities comprised $11.4M in unsecured borrowings from the public, $2.4M in other unsecured creditors, and $3.6M in creditors claiming secured status. Mr Stannard emphasised, then that settlement with unsecured creditors would be a lengthy process, and that it was impossible to give any estimate of the total amount they would eventually receive.