Buyers eye Harts NZ

Friday 28th September 2001

Harts New Zealand will be sold within the next few weeks, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

Parent company Harts Australasia is reported to have put the New Zealand operation on the block after running into trouble across the Tasman. The report said there had been strong interest.

Harts entered the local market in 1999 with the purchase from insurer Sovereign of Reeves Moses Hudig.

The New Zealand operation accounted for a third of Harts' assets and contributed June-year revenue of $6.1 million.

Harts New Zealand is still working through a legacy of failed contributory mortgage schemes it inherited when it bought Reeves Moses.

Former Reeves Moses directors Roger Moses and Gary Stevens, and a former employee, Peter Van Nieuwkoop, are defending charges brought by the Registrar of Companies alleging offences relating to the contributory mortgage schemes.

Harts Australasia posted a $A92.8 million June-year loss and is facing action by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission on a number of fronts.

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