Here is another Julie “lingerie on expenses” Meyer mystery share transfer for the Ariadne administrator & FCA to ponder

I continue the world of smoke and mirrors of Julie Meyer with a look at Ariadne Capital Partners GP Limited, supposedly a business engaged in fund administration which the great entrepreneur founded on 13 January 2010. It has one £1 share but who owns that share? Both the FCA and the Administrator of Julie’s flagship Ariadne Capital Limited might want to have a butchers.

Over at companies house, an annual return filed on 24 February 2016 but dated as 13 January shows that the owner of that one share was Ariadne Capital Limited. ACL went into administration in December 2017 but on 11 April 2017 facing a first strike off notice for non filing and with ACL already in dire financial trouble, we see a confirmation statement showing that the shares as at 13 January 2017 now belonged to Julie Meyer herself.

Hang on a second? ACPGP was owned by a company with many shareholders (ACL) but now is owned just by Ms Meyer. What did she pay for this asset? Can the administrator/FCA find a record of a board minute justifying the purchase price paid?

Wind forward to 16 November 2018 and there is a confirmation statement recording that on 28 June 2018, the shares were transferred to Pelion Pension Advisers, now Viva Investment partners, run by er…Julie Meyer.  Whatever.

Oddly for this company, it seems as if Julie is still staying in the shadows as a director as companies house shows her, now, former business partner Dr Rene Eichenberger still in charge. One suspects after he opted to spill the beans on her wicked ways, that will change.

So what is ACPGP? It seems to have no business and indeed there is an insistence in some filings that it is dormant. It may be dormant in the revenue sense but its abridged accounts show that year in year out the amount it owes to other parties gets ever higher. The last set of accounts shows called up share capital not paid £0 (whatever), current assets £0, prepayments and accrued income £1,432 and 717,779 owed to creditors due after more than one year.  That long term creditor number has risen year on year since inception.

So to whom does ACPGP owe cash? History suggests that the sums were owed to Ariadne Capital Limited but then that asset of ACL was transferred without payment to Ariadne Malta and now to Viva. Of course it will never get paid but it is another aspect of these transactions which both Andrew Duncan of Leonard Curtis and the FCA should be taking a long hard look at…