RI firm hold chunk of Peregrine assets

RI firm hold chunk of Peregrine assets

HONG KONG (Reuters): Most of the assets of Peregrine Fixed Income Ltd are in the hands of parties whose credit worthiness is suspect, Price Waterhouse partners and liquidators of the Peregrine Investments Holdings Ltd unit said.

Creditors were told at a meeting yesterday they could expect to recover 19 to 52 percent of the money owed to them depending on whether liabilities were at the high or low end of an estimated range of US$1.94 billion to US$2.41 billion.

Peregrine Fixed Income's had assets of US$2.08 billion with realizable assets estimated at US$468 million in a worse case scenario and US$1.01 billion in a best case scenario.

Price Waterhouse said it had recovered about US$264 million so far from monies owed to Peregrine Fixed Income as at May 31.

"Roughly three quarters of the US$2 billion are in the bad book and a quarter in the good book," Price Waterhouse partner Ted Osborn told reporters after the creditors meeting.

Simon Copley, another Price Waterhouse partner, said HK$1.09 billion of the total was made of bonds and other derivatives concerning Indonesian parties. "Who knows how much money one is going to get out of Indonesia," he said.

The amount with U.S. and European banks was US$491 million, or 23.6 percent of the total, and Thai bonds and derivatives accounted for US$264 million, or 12.7 percent of the total.

Korean bonds and derivatives accounted for US$62 million.

Liquidators said they had also identified areas, during preliminary investigations into the collapse of Peregrine Fixed Income, which were worth probing.

"Clearly we started doing preliminary investigations. We have identified certain areas that are worth probing. That needs to be taken forward," said Price Waterhouse partner David Hague.

Liquidators said there was a lack of documentation at Peregrine Fixed Income which had hampered their work since the company collapsed in January.

"The accounts were only up to the 30th of November when we got here. There were lots of failed trades," said Copley.

Copley, Hague and Osborn were made liquidators of Peregrine Fixed Income at yesterday's meeting. The creditors of the company's parent Peregrine Investments Holdings Ltd are due to meet today.