An unusual offer to buy shares in listed sex industry group Planet Platinum has attracted the ire of the corporate regulator.
Late last month, a Melbourne company called G Spot International began sending letters to Planet Platinum shareholders, offering to buy their stakes for the princely sum of 10¢ each.
For two companies that are apparently unconnected, G Spot and Planet Platinum, which runs King Street strip club Showgirls Bar 20 and is the landlord of the Daily Planet brothel, seem very close – physically, at least.
G Spot, which is run by accountant Sandy Constantine, shares the same Melbourne address as Planet Platinum, run by John Trimble, the nephew of late drug lord ‘‘Aussie’’ Bob Trimbole: the Lonsdale Street offices of Mr Constantine’s firm, Bryant & Bryant.
However, there is no suggestion the companies are connected in any other way.
Mr Constantine could not be reached – his office said he was on leave – and Mr Trimble did not return calls.
In a letter to shareholders, a copy of which has been obtained by BusinessDay, G Spot’s ‘‘financial adviser’’, Collins Wentworth, also associated with Mr Constantine, warned that Planet Platinum was suspended from the stock exchange ‘‘and has still significant issues to overcome’’.
Planet Platinum made a splashy ASX debut early in 2003 as The Daily Planet, celebrating its place as the first listed brothel business in the world by hiring Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss to sip champagne on opening day. It bought Bar 20 later that year.
Since then there have been run-ins with licensing authorities, suspensions from the exchange and battles with minority shareholders.
In its letter, Collins Wentworth did not specify the ‘‘significant issues’’. ‘‘We ask that you make your own enquiries in respect of the same,’’ it said.
It said that before Planet Platinum was suspended from the ASX, its shares last traded ‘‘in the order of 15¢ per share.’’
This is incorrect. Bloomberg data shows that Planet Platinum shares last traded on September 24, 2012, when a measly 6000 shares changed hands at 20¢ each while the thinly traded stock was enjoying one of its brief respites from suspension.
Trade was again suspended on October 1, because the company failed to lodge its full year accounts on time.
The window opened again on February 13, 2013, after Planet Platinum filed the long-overdue paperwork. But it slammed shut again less than a month later, on March 8, after Nick Pitliangis resigned from the board.
This left the company with only two directors, and the ASX requires three.
The company attempted to fix the problem last year, when its annual shareholder meeting approved the appointment of King Street veteran Rob ‘‘The Robot’’ Bottazzi as a director, ‘‘conditional upon the approval of the Victorian Commission for Gambling and Liquor Regulation’’.
However, Mr Bottazzi, a some-time business associate of colourful Geelong mayor Darryn Lyons, later withdrew his consent to act as director.
Meanwhile, Mr Trimble continues to control Planet Platinum’s fortunes. In addition to running the strip club and keeping the brothel premises spick and span, he owns 80 per cent of the company.
Minority shareholders who own the rest of the company have been nothing but trouble for Mr Trimble, rejecting the remuneration report last year and forcing him to hold a meeting to consider spilling the board.
Mr Trimble’s overwhelming shareholding ensured he won the June 6 showdown, which ended with him storming from the venue – a dim, wood-panelled back room of the King Street club – to cries of ‘‘shame’’.
The stock’s suspension continues. However, while Planet Platinum has yet to tell the market, in June this year it did very briefly have three directors.
On June 17, Mr Trimble’s son, Michael, was appointed to the board. He resigned later the same day.
Getting rid of the minority shareholders would enable Mr Trimble to de-list the company, taking it private and ending all the hassles and humiliations of meeting the ASX disclosure standards.
Fairfax is not suggesting that Mr Trimble is connected in any way to G Spot’s bid – which has in any case been stopped.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has invoked a section of the Corporations Act that allows it to halt offers that do not comply with the law.
Following a flurry of correspondence over the past fortnight, on Tuesday it slapped a final order over the mystery bid, forbidding it from going ahead.
