I’ll survive and won’t starve, Hotchin says

They’ll have to make do without the Mercedes and Porsche Cayenne but former Hanover boss Mark Hotchin, wife Amanda and three kids won’t starve over Christmas on the Gold Coast.

They’ve got a $A240,000 cash stash in Australia to see them through, plus Mr Hotchin gets $1000 a week to live on from New Zealand assets frozen by the Securities Commission the other day.

It might be beneath them to run about in rental cars, give up their art works, nice furniture and jewellery – and the kids might have to ditch private school – but it’s not all bad.

Weather is great at his multi-million dollar Mermaid Beach property where a shorts and T-shirt Mr Hotchin is said to have been “living out of a suitcase.”

And chief High Court judge Justice Helen Winkelmann kindly relaxed a Securities Commission freezing order on Mr Hotchin’s New Zealand assets a wee bit to allow him some clothes, photographs and personal household items.

The Securities Commission opposed all Mr Hotchin’s bids to ease the freeze order, which was imposed to prevent the dissipation of his assets.

The commission is investigating potential breaches of the Securities Act in relation to prospectuses issued by three of Mr Hotchin’s companies – Hanover Finance, Hanover Capital and United Finance.

Porsche used to ferry kids
Justice Winkelmann refused to let Mr Hotchin ship his $200,000 Mercedes and his wife’s $90,000 Porsche Cayenne – used for ferrying the kids around – to Australia, even after he offered to pay the $1700 shipping costs.

Mr Hotchin even promised to return the vehicles if necessary but the Securities Commission said that would be difficult to enforce if he didn’t and again the judge said no.

The judge refused to allow substantial furniture, arts works and jewellery to leave the country, despite a late plea by Mr Hotchin’s QC Bruce Stewart that it would be items with individual values of up to only $15,000.

Justice Winkelmann refused to give Mr Hotchin access to New Zealand assets from which to pay $160,000 of bills – suggesting there was sufficient in Mr Hotchin’s $A240,000 Australian cash stash to pay outstanding bills and living expenses.

When Mr Stewart said half the Australian money – $A120,000 – was Mrs Hotchin’s, the judge said Mrs Hotchin also had a liability to contribute to living expenses and she could also help pay the outstanding bills.

Justice Winkelmann also refused Mr Hotchin’s request for the Securities Commission to disclose at this stage forensic accountant David Crichton's report, which served as the grounds for the assets freeze order.

Mr Hotchin – who claimed his living expenses were $6500 a week – dropped a bid to have a $1000 a week living allowance imposed by the asset freezing order increased to between $6000 and $7000 a week.

Surviving on $1000 a week
Messrs Stewart said Hotchin agreed “to survive on $1000 a week” until a substantive court hearing in February challenging the freezing order.

All Mr Hotchin wanted to do was maintain the lifestyle he was accustomed to, Mr Stewart told Justice Winkelmann.

Mr Hotchin failed to have his allowance for legal expenses expanded to cover the Securities Commission investigation, any charges, and any Serious Fraud Office proceedings.

Mr Stewart said he was concerned by the Securities Commission monitoring Mr Hotchin’s lawyers and said any suggestion Mr Hotchin’s lawyers were going to ramp up the legal bills and pass money back to him “is not going to happen.”

Details of Mr Hotchin’s freeze order were to be disclosed by the court this week.

They were expected to include property assets in Gulf Harbour, Auckland’s Paritai Drive, a Coromandel farm, sections at Jack’s Point, Queenstown, a Karaka farm, office buildings in Auckland and the family’s exclusive Boatshed Bay retreat on Waiheke Island.

The court heard Mr Hotchin hoped some bills might be paid from a $1.6 million debt owed him by his company Okahu Capital as a result of an advance from his Ka No.2 Trustee but that money was unrecoverable.

His financial affairs were not easy to unravel and accountants Ernst & Young were not assisting because he owed them money.

Tax issue
The court heard Mr Hotchin also had a $5 million tax issue, involving penalties and use of money interest.

Who told the papers, judge wanted to know
How did so much detail of what was to be dealt with at a closed hearing get into the newspaper. Justice Winkelmann wanted to know.

In an exchange with Mr Hotchin’s QC Bruce Stewart, the judge said the front page of the New Zealand Herald – which carried details of what relief Mr Hotchin wanted from the assets freezing order – contained “information I did not expect to see.”

In response to the judge’s questions, Mr Stewart said he did not know where the information came from that Mr Hotchin wanted his weekly allowance increased from $1000 to between $6000 and $7000, but it wasn’t from him.

“We are relaxed about that figure being out there,” Mr Stewart said.

After further questioning from Justice Winkelmann it appeared agreed that how the media got details from Mr Hotchin’s affidavit would remain a mystery.

Justice Winkelmann lifted a reporting ban – which including a ban on tweeting from the courtroom – at the end of the hearing to allow media coverage.