Asia Pacific

A restructured Colorado Group will emerge from receivership as the newly named Fusion Retail Brands, flush with a $70 million capital expenditure and marketing war chest to drive its success in the tough retail environment, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. The appearance of Fusion will help secure the future of flagship Australian brands that once made up the Colorado Group - Diana Ferrari, JAG, Mathers and Williams - as well as the company's 2200 staff working across 282 stores.

After one of the ugliest retail downturns in two decades, corporate doctors are warning that more retailers will hit the wall in the next 12 months, The Australian reported. "This is the hardest retail environment I've seen in 20 years," Ferrier Hodgson partner and retail specialist James Stewart said. Mr Stewart expects more insolvencies among retailers in the next 12 months. PwC retail partner Stuart Harker also expects more retailers to go into voluntary administration or receivership in the next year.

High levels of bad and classified loans weighed on the finances of the Makati-based LBC Development Bank, which was recently closed by the Bangko Sentral and placed under the receivership of the government’s Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp, Manila Standard Today reported. Data from the Bangko Sentral showed that LBC Development Bank, a thrift bank formerly known as the Banco Real Development Bank that was taken over by the LBC Group of Companies in 1995, suffered from high levels of bad and classified loans.

Guarantors have become the lenders of last resort to small manufacturers who increasingly are getting squeezed by tight credit as well as soaring wages and other production costs, The Wall Street Journal reported. These private operators, using money raised from property developers, coal miners or other cash-rich individuals, aim to fill the funding void left by state banks that many say have all but stopped lending to small businesses. In return, they charge their clients a fee on top of high interest rates imposed on the loans.

LBC Development Bank, a unit of the LBC Group, has been placed under receivership of the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp (PDIC), the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported. In a statement over the weekend, PDIC said it took over the assets and liabilities of LBC bank after the Monetary Board of the central bank determined that the institution was plagued by liquidity problems. LBC Development Bank, with head office on JP Rizal St. in Makati City, had 19 branches nationwide. As of end-June this year, total deposits placed with the bank amounted to P6.09 billion.

Australia’s largest seller of solar panels, Solar Shop, has been placed in receivership and will be put up for sale, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. On Wednesday Ferrier Hodgson was appointed receivers and managers of the Adelaide-based business that employs 200 people directly and has a dozen display centres around the country. Ferrier partner John Lindholm said it would be business as usual while the receivers, acting on behalf of secured creditor Westpac, conducted an urgent review of the business, which also includes Solar Hut.

The latest receivers' report for failed finance company Bridgecorp makes predictably grim reading for investors, with a mere $1.5 million recovered from its assets in the six months to July 1, Stuff.co.nz reported. Receivers Colin McCloy and Maurice Noone of PWC repeated their assessment that debenture holders owed $459m are likely to recover less than 10c in the dollar. Subsequent to the period covered by the report a further $4m was recovered and in August receivers sent debenture holders their first payment since Bridgecorp collapsed in July 2007.

South Canterbury Finance's (SCF) receivership has seen the biggest taxpayer loss of any corporate failure in New Zealand's history, Labour MP David Cunliffe says. The country faces a net loss of $1.3 billion, and growing, following the collapse of SCF, the Labour finance spokesman said when visiting Timaru yesterday, Stuff.co.nz reported. He says the Government could have limited its loss to $500 million and took a shot at Rangitata MP Jo Goodhew's handling of the issue. She labelled his comments "distasteful".

One of Sydney's most famous car dealers, with a sprawling dealership that has become a city landmark, has hit a roadblock, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. Rick Damelian's Damelian Group, which made headlines when it unsuccessfully tried to sell Lara Bingle's Aston Martin, was placed in receivership yesterday owing National Australia Bank about $80 million. The receiver, Ferrier Hodgson, moved quickly to calm customers by insisting no new car buyers would be left out of pocket.

The Wellington accountancy firm at the centre of multimillion-dollar fraud allegations against its owners has been placed in receivership and put up for sale, Stuff.co.nz reported. On Friday, Deloitte was appointed receiver of TPS Accounting – known until recently as Tax Planning Services – just eight weeks after its directors lost in the Supreme Court a nine-month battle to prevent their names being published. In July, David Ingram Rowley and Barrie James Skinner were revealed as the accountants at the centre of a $9 million tax fraud case, in which Inland Revenue claims it lost $2.9m.