Faded glory When the corporate plod recently suspended the...

Faded glory


When the corporate plod recently suspended the Australian financial services license of Robert Crossman’s Corpac Partners, it jogged a few memories for CBD.
ASIC cited the firm’s failure to lodge financial statements and auditors reports for a period of four years for the suspension.
Crossman made his name in the 1990s working for Rothschild before running Hartley Poynton's investment banking division. He left to set up Corpac Partners in 2001.
The Corpac name might not mean much for a lot of people but in 2007, Corpac was able to claim that it ranked third in Australia for project finance, ahead of big names like Babcock & Brown and Macquarie.
Most of this was work it performed for West Australian Ric Stowe’s privately owned Griffin group.
Corpac was the engine room for the massive debt raisings which ultimately triggered the group’s collapse under more than a billion dollars worth of debt.
Crossman was closely involved in the web of companies that controlled Stowe’s empire and the 2007 financial accounts – the last CBD could find for Corpac – showed how lucrative it was for the firm.
Over 2007 and the previous financial year, Corpac generated net profits totalling $22.6 million and paid out $21 million worth of dividends.
The collapse of Stowe’s empire seems to have coincided with Corpac’s dormant accounts.
But it does not seem to be too much of a problem for Crossman who has gone on to join boutique advisor, Origin Capital Group. He is also executive chairman of explorer and casual pot stock, Capital Mining.
Crossman took a contrarian stance last year, when he joined Capital, and triggered its exit from the medicinal marijuana market late last year to concentrate on mining.
The problem for Capital Mining – which has been suspended from trading since August last year - is that Fairfax Media, and the ASX, got fixated last year on the exorbitant amounts it was spending on consultants – as opposed to more esoteric pursuits like its actual mining operations.
For the June quarter last year it spent just $175,000 on exploration but $637,000 on admin and corporate costs, most of which was spent on consultants and directors fees.
Payments to venture capitalists Chapmans got particular scrutiny from the ASX but didn't warrant any action. The interesting link for CBD is that Crossman was – very briefly – chairman of Chapmans back in 2013.

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