Rod Back On Mobile Blowers

Sydney Morning Herald

Thursday January 24, 2008

Michael Evans

Michael Evans notes the Americans call them cell phones.

RODNEY ADLER knows a thing or two about phones.

He was a director of failed phone company One.Tel.

He was even caught "misusing" one while in slam and confined to his cell for three days.

And, in the months before he went to the naughty corner, Rocket had a habit of feeding loose change into Telstra's public facilities in the areas downstairs from his offices in Australia Square.

Heaven knows why anyone on their way to the clink would want to use a public phone.

But Rodney's a free man again and he's back in business in Australia Square in the same office at Tesla Investments and with the same secretary.

He's even got a parking spot for what one observer described as a very suburban gold Honda Accord.

Not only has Rodney been spotted in recent times running around Australia Square, he's also been spotted using a little more modern technology. Gone is the loose change for the public phones.

Rodney's back on a mobile. After all, every self-respecting businessman with a mullet has to have a mobile.

Our spy even reported that while they couldn't be certain, Rodney's ringtone may have just been playing Greensleeves.

Maybe he wants to be a Mr Whippy.

The biter bitten

We can only wonder what the once high-flying, art-collecting, waterfront living Tempo boss John Schaeffer makes of the shenanigans at Allco Financial Group.

After all, Schaeffer felt the tight squeeze of Allco's lending hand, er, arm on a margin call a few years back when shares in his cleaning concern tanked.

Schaeffer had to sell his waterfront pile, Boomerang, and flog the country's most exciting Victorian art collection to come up with the readies for David Coe and his chums.

Fast forward to about July last year, when the $10 Allco stock began a decline, culminating yesterday, when there was a margin call on the stock, which by then was only $3. The forced selling caused another 25 per cent fall in the price of Allco shares.

The call was on a fund which is Allco's biggest shareholder and just happens to include a lot of Allco senior executives as shareholders. Whose art collection might come under pressure this time? David Coe's?

Makes you wonder how a private equity-owned Qantas would be faring given one of its could-have-been major shareholders had hit such a rocky patch of turbulence.

And we never thought we'd say it. But the one-time walking bad luck charm Peter Yates is an awfully lucky man. He's well out of the rapidly unfolding mess at Allco.

Bargain in basement

While Kerry Stokes scouts around looking for something, anything, to buy with his $2.6 billion private equity windfall, he appears to have stumbled have on something close to home that he thinks represents a bit of good value.

Last August, Seven announced it would buy back up to 10 per cent of its stock any time from September for period of a year if falling markets provided the opportunity.

It's fair to say that Seven has spied that opportunity of late.

Not a day too soon, the network appointed Citigroup to the job and we hear that they've already started taking advantage of a share price that is 16 per cent off its November highs.

At least it will keep a few of those nervous Citibankers worrying about an axe swinging from New York in gainful employment.

Not exactly zooming

Publishing empires start out small. Even Lachlan Murdoch's.

His Illyria investment vehicle has had a website, of sorts, for more than a year, containing not much more than a plain white page with a phone number, email address and ABN.

But after the announcement of Lachlan's deal with James Packer, the site has sprung into life.

It now has a white background, phone number, email address, ABN and a fancy stylised Illyria banner plus a link to the announcement of the deal.

We look forward to the official unveiling of the company logo that we revealed in these column inches last year.

It features a man in tights fighting alongside a lion superimposed on a map of Istria, the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. Or is that the Bronte peninsula?

McCain and able

Sol Trujillo has been busy getting a few more stamps in the passport with a visit in recent weeks to Las Vegas to attend the world's biggest gadget fest, the Consumer Electronics Show.

He's been there at least two years in a row. Last year, he took the whole board. This time there was a valise of Telstra execs along for the ride.

Of course, Sol's got other interests Stateside.

We hear he also popped over to Phoenix, capital of Arizona, for a Citigroup conference.

Phoenix, by chance, is also home to decorated Vietnam vet, John McCain, who happens to be firming as the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for the White House.

For his part, Sol is a member of McCain's Hispanic Advisory Council. We can only wonder if he stopped by for some apple pie. Or a chat about Government appointments.

The coming blockades of Telstra's Melbourne HQ by disgruntled subcontractors won't provide a welcome return.

© 2008 Sydney Morning Herald

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