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Only weeks after being forced into a 10 million-plus bailout of major pub tenant National Leisure & Gaming, Cairns pub owner and property tycoon Tom Hedley watched as almost 28.5 per cent was wiped from the value of 70 million shares he owns in the Hedley Leisure & Gaming Property Fund.

Hedley trust shares lost 37c to close at 93c, and that translated to a $26.2 million loss on the day for Mr Hedley, who is reputed to have margin loans of between 30 and 60 per cent on his 56 per cent stake in the trust.

All up, Hedley trust shares lost $55 million of their value.

Worth $715 million in the latest BRW Rich List, the tycoon is colloquially known as owning half of Cairns, where he even still runs the plumbing service where he got his start in business.

He rose to national prominence in 2006 after selling his pub operating business to Coles for $330 million.

Mr Hedley invested more than $192 million of his own money when the Hedley Property and Leisure Gaming Fund debuted on the ASX at $3.50 a share last August.

But fallout from the sub-prime crisis immediately hit the fund, wiping 20 per cent from the stock in its first month.

According to analysts, concerns about HLG have been around for weeks because of reports that the group had problems settling seven recent hotel purchases.

While analysts do not believe HLG is in danger of breaching debt covenants in its full-year 2008 results, concerns about portfolio values, including the effect of smoking bans, remain.

Yesterday's share meltdown set off some market speculation that corporate raider Sir Ron Brierley, who has a personal shareholding in the troubled National Leisure & Gaming Group, may be waiting in the wings as the story behind HLG unravels.

HLG tried to ease investor concerns yesterday in a statement to the ASX confirming it had delivered its maiden distribution of 13c per stapled security and reduced bank debt by $45 million.

But a clearer picture is likely to emerge today when ABN AMRO Morgans releases a much-anticipated note.

The Hedley fund owns more than 90 pubs and 16 bottle shops, and even has a 24 per cent stake in its largest competitor, the ALE Property Group, which owns a further 102 pubs.

But it also owes more than $900 million to five Australian trading banks in a syndicate led by the ANZ. It also has a stake of 20 per cent in the troubled National Leisure and Gaming group, which Mr Hedley was forced to bail out last month through the injection of more than $10 million into NLG, after its $26.5 million rights issue failed miserably.

As an underwriter of the issue, Mr Hedley was forced to take up a $10 million-plus shortfall in the capital raising.

NLG is a major Hedley pub tenant, with its 32 hotels due to pay the trust rent of almost $33.4 million in 2008.