Opes filings reveal many tricks, no treatsAdvertisementEmail...

Opes filings reveal many tricks, no treats
AdvertisementEmail Print Normal font Large font AdvertisementMark Hawthorne
November 11, 2008
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FORMER Opes Prime boss and founder Lirim "Laurie" Emini has been fairly quiet around town of late.

Indeed, there are a few bars on King Street missing his patronage, but Emini appears to have been hard at it in recent weeks. Six months after Opes fell, Emini has finally lodged his report as to affairs for Opes Prime Stockbroking.

As the Form 407 document makes for some nightmarish reading, it's rather apt that Emini signed it on Halloween.

The document lists the debtors and creditors of the Opes Prime mess — thousands of them are named in the public document — and they cross all boundaries of society.

However, one stands out, Sydney lawyer Chris Murphy, and his three Opes accounts form the "black hole" into which Opes Prime disappeared.

Murphy's Cardiac Jolt is listed as owing $57,385,988.69. Sarah Brown, another of the private accounts run out of Murphy's Elizabeth Street office, is listed as owing $41,939850.86. Then there's the account in Murphy's own name — another $21,667,149.86 in the red. All three of Murphy's accounts have the notes "F & H" listed after them. Note F means the amount is an estimate, made from the "close-out position of the accounts" when receivers were appointed in March. Note H means the account has been "possibly cross-collatoralised with one or more other clients' accounts" — one of the measures used by Opes to briefly hide some massive losses.

Debtors of Opes Prime have received claims from the receiver — Full Disclosure likes the tale of one who was sent documents and a bill for $56 he owed, in a registered mail parcel that cost $70 to post.

Debtors include former poker machine operator Nick Mitris who, along with partner Nick Balagiannis, sold the Olympic Video Gaming company for $170 million in 1997.

According to Emini's Form 407, Mitris' Niako Investments of Clayton South owes $10,567,953.33. That account also has Note H next to it.

Timbercorp non-executive director Antony Baillieu has also felt the heat.

His Opes account Penalty One, controlled by the Antony Sam Baillieu Family Account, was in the red to the tune of $4.8 million.

It should be noted that Baillieu is also listed a creditor, and is owed $3.9 million — although some protracted negotiations have to be endured for that debt to realise any money from compensation