By
Alice Uribe & Vishal Teckchandani Mon 22 Mar 2010
The Supreme Court of NSW has ordered that five Trio Capital funds be wound up, paving the way for the pursuit of their underlying assets.
The Supreme Court of New South Wales has ruled that five Trio Capital funds, including the Astarra Strategic Fund (ASF), be wound up.
Justice Palmer on Friday ruled that funds including the ASF, ARP Growth, Astarra Overseas Equities Pool, Asttar Portfolio Service and Asttar Wholesale Portfolio Service be wound up on just and equitable grounds due to insolvency.
It is "highly unlikely that responsible entities will be found to substitute for Trio and winding up [is] inevitable. The sooner the administration begins, the sooner the pursuit of assets can begin ... the better for unitholders," Palmer said.
The ruling came after Trio's administrators, PPB, said in February that following an initial investigation of each of Trio's managed investment schemes, a number of funds had substantial assets that were unlikely to be realised in the short term and were therefore proposed to be wound up.
A letter from ASIC was produced to the court on Friday that said the regulator neither consented nor opposed a winding up of the funds.
ASIC's investigations into Trio are continuing.
Palmer said the investing public should know about the dangers of investing in schemes that are not "utterly transparent" and not "managed by reputable responsible entities".
"I was disturbed to read that so much of the funds have been channeled through entities in the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands," he said.
"[These are] all hallmarks of an endeavour to avoid scrutiny in the plain light of day and it has be emphasised publicly by the court if no-one else is going to do it."
The ASF financial statements for the year ended 30 June 2009 show the fund had total assets of around $118 million, ASIC said in an announcement last year.
According to an update to unitholders by PPB on 26 February, the Asttar Wholesale Portfolio Service had net assets of $63.47 million, ARP Growth had $58.6 million, Astarra Overseas Equities Pool had $8.97 million and Asttar Portfolio Service had $4.16 million.
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