perth to stage dynasty showdown

Found by oyabun....

Scott Rochfort
March 17, 2011

The soap opera in the Dynasty Metals boardroom is quickly resembling one of the power struggles portrayed in the much-loved US television series of the same name.

An attempt by the Dynasty director Lewis Tay to dump three of his fellow directors will come to a head on Monday when the iron-ore explorer will host a meeting in Perth. Shareholders will vote on whether to remove Malcolm Carson, Ian Levy and Graham Anderson.

''I want to cut the board size, cut the distance from the boardroom to the iron ore deposit and cut the cost of running Dynasty Metals," Tay, who is based in Point Piper, said in a statement late on Wednesday.

Advertisement: Story continues below The Chinese-born Tay received $710,500 in remuneration last financial year, compared to the combined $916,200 paid to the three directors he wants to dump.

Tay's crusade to cut costs will not extend to dumping Xiao Dong Sun from the board, suggesting he is keen to win the support of Dynasty's largest shareholder, Hebei Xinghua Iron, which has a 13 per cent stake. There is also a sizeable contingent of Chinese shareholders on the company's register.

In a circular to shareholders early this month (both in English and Mandarin), Dynasty's ''independent board committee'' (aka the three directors Tay wants to dump) alleged the tensions with Tay stemmed from his purchase of ''speculative shares in mining companies in the name of Dynasty'' last December.

This was after the board ordered in February last year for all the company's share investments to be sold and put into a term deposit.

''In early January 2011 it came to the directors' attention that Mr Tay was still purchasing speculative shares in Dynasty's name, using Dynasty funds,'' the independent board committee said in the statement. ''The other directors were not aware of this because Mr Tay had arranged for the share trading statements not to be sent to Dynasty's Sydney or Perth offices, but instead to a private post office box used by himself and some other Dynasty shareholders,'' the committee said.

Some of the stocks that caught Tay's eye were Atlas Iron, Cudeco, and Argonaut Resources. After the alleged breach, Tay was demoted from his executive role to a non-executive post on January 17. The next day Tay called a meeting to dump his fellow directors.

The Dynasty director Malcolm Carson (who happens to be Cudeco's former exploration manager) said: ''We are an exploration company and don't need to take on other companies exploration risk.''

P.O. BOX

Tay assured CBD there was nothing untoward about his use of a personal PO box for his receiving of Dynasty share statements. ''It was only about convenience,'' he said. Tay argued he was using his personal address because Dynasty was already being in a state of flux - whether it should relocate its office from Sydney to Perth.

Asked whether he was willing to move to Perth with Dynasty, Tay said: ''I actually have relatives in Perth.''

In a statement this week Tay's public relations firm attempted to shoot down allegations or inaccurate statements made about the businessman.

''The $8000 telephone bill was for five months and had been bolstered by roaming charges during business trips,'' was one of the clarifications Tay wanted to get across.

''He does hold a Bachelor in Applied Science, not Science as incorrectly appeared in the last annual report. This was an oversight. However, the company's website has always stated his qualification as a Bachelor of Applied Science degree,'' the statement added.


This is getting some air-time. Always a good thing!!! Time to progress after Monday...

E.