The government is setting up a company to manage the recovery of the remaining assets of six finance companies placed in receivership while they had Crown guarantees, The National Business Review reported. "Right throughout the Retail Deposit Guarantee scheme the Government has sought to minimise disruption to the economy, while reducing the cost to taxpayers," Mr English says. "The receiverships of these six firms have reached the stage where all the readily marketable assets have been sold.

Bridgecorp renewed investment offers to the public despite directors being aware the finance company had been missing interest payments to securities holders, the Crown argued this morning, The New Zealand Herald reported. The High Court this morning also heard Bridgecorp staff were told to lie to investors calling up asking where their payments were.

Taranaki baking business Yarrows (The Bakers) has been sold by receivers BDO to a member of the founding family, John Yarrow, The New Zealand Herald reported. He had originally sold his stake to his brother Paul in 2005, resulting in a legal fight within the family when Paul took him to court over a purchase price he alleged was too high, before settling out of court. The sale, which also includes a solvent Rotorua company, Gilles Bakery, was for an undisclosed sum and follows a five-month search for a buyer by accounting firm BDO, which was appointed receiver in May.

Receivers have been appointed to another company in Wellington property developer Terry Serepisos' empire and have taken over the management of his own headquarters, The New Zealand Herald reported. Deloitte's Barry Jordan and David Vance were appointed receivers and managers of Century City Investments on Friday. It owns the ASB Tower on Wellington's Hunter St, which is home to the Century City offices, according to a statement on the accounting firm's website.

New Zealand and the companies that cut its credit rating last week have a different view of the country’s ability to curb government and household debt, Finance Minister Bill English said, Bloomberg reported. Standard & Poor’s, which reduced New Zealand’s long-term foreign currency rating to AA from AA+ on Sept. 30 said there’s a likelihood household and corporate debt will continue to rise even as earthquake-related spending pressures and fiscal stimulus to support growth strain the government’s ability to curb borrowing.

Sir Michael Fay says his group's bid for the Crafar farms remains on the table despite being rejected by the receivers yesterday, The New Zealand Herald reported. The group's $171.5 million offer is almost $30 million short of that from China's Pengxin International Group. KordaMentha receiver Brendon Gibson said the accepted Pengxin offer was by far the best offer and remained so. Regarding Fay's offer, he said: "It was conditional and a collaboration of several companies and was a price that we think was unacceptable, so no go on any of those fronts.

Wellington businessman and former Phoenix football owner Terry Serepisos has been declared bankrupt in the High Court at Wellington after his last-minute bid for more time to pay debts was rejected, The New Zealand Herald reported. Judge Gendall granted an application by South Canterbury Finance, owed some $22.5 million, to declare Serepisos bankrupt after he failed to convince the court to grant him four more days to secure funding from a Hong Kong-based merchant bank.

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".

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.