The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is appealing the dismissal of its case over Pactific National’s purchase of Aurizon’s Acacia Ridge Terminal in Queensland, challenging the Federal Court’s power to accept Pacific National’s last-minute promise to ensure access to the major freight terminal by competitors.
An appeals court has tossed a challenge to the dismissal of an investor class action against the Public Trustee of Queensland over a failure to predict the 2008 collapse of Gold Coast-based finance group Octaviar, finding that the class had run a case based on allegations outside of its claims.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has asked a court to impose penalties of up to $36 million on an AMP subsidiary for failing to take reasonable steps to stop its representatives from churning life insurance policies.
The Commonwealth has agreed to fund a public examination into the affairs of collapsed Queensland-based construction group JM Kelly, after liquidators uncovered a complicated web of inter-company loans.
AIG Australia has failed to convince the Full Federal Court that an insolvency exclusion in a directors and officers policy held by Kaboko Mining should exempt it from covering claims brought by the collapsed mining company against four former executives after a failure to repay a US$5.95 million loan allegedly led to the company’s insolvency.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has come up short again in its challenge to Pacific National’s $205 million acquisition of competitor Aurizon’s Queensland freight terminal, with a judge shooting down the regulator’s request for a variation of Pacific’s undertaking that it will not block third parties from accessing the terminal.
The former chief executive officer of Hastie Services has admitted to asking staff to make up for a shortfall between forecast and actual profits at the firm, but claims he made the order with the expectation it would be done legally, the jury hearing a criminal case against him was told.
A former finance manager from Hastie Services and key witness for the prosecution in the criminal trial against two of the company’s former executives only pointed the finger at former COO Ian Thompson to avoid jail time herself, a jury has heard.
Novartis has launched an appeal following a ruling by IP Australia that a proposed patent for an oral form of its top-selling multiple sclerosis drug Gilenya is invalid for lack of inventive step.
The former CEO of a unit of collapsed construction firm Hastie Group told staff to “raid the balance books” to make up financial targets linked to his bonus, prosecutors said at the outset of a two-month criminal trial.