Media Square executives and bankers colluded on buyout from administrators|MSFI

Dec. 30, 2011 - PRLog -- The bank that reportedly lost a large amount of money on the appointment of administrators to the former public company Media Square has emerged as a stakeholder in the newly created company that bought the business back, according to a report in "Marketing Services Financial Intelligence".

Uberior Trading, a subsidiary of Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS), is identified as a party to the shareholders’ agreement governing the conduct of MSQ Partners, the company set up by former Media Square executives Peter Reid, Roger Parry and Dean Wright to implement the management buyout.  HBOS was banker to Media Square.

As a result of the above arrangements, the senior board members of the defunct Media Square and its bankers have emerged as part owners of the new company whereas all the outside ordinary shareholders in Media Square have lost their entire investment without being given any opportunity to acquire shares in the successor business. However, there is no suggestion that any party has acted unlawfully.

Among those former shareholders are Bob Morton’s Hawk Investment Holdings and Peter Lynch’s Prime Active Capital, both of whom had agitated to take over the management of Media Square during what became a terminal decline.  Morton has already threatened to challenge the conduct of the administration, claiming that Media Square’s shareholders were “kept in the dark and not kept informed at any stage”.

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"Marketing Services Financial Intelligence" provides financial news and analysis about the marketing communications industry; edited by industry expert Bob Willott, an accountant and former special professor at the Nottingham University Business School