ODCE’s INM affidavit shines unwelcome light on alleged Buckley views of Davy

The affidavit filed by the State's corporate enforcer, Ian Drennan, as part of his application to have court inspectors appointed to Independent News & Media (INM) is a veritable cornucopia of juicy allegations.

Buried deep within them, however, is one brief, easily missed reference that shines a very unwelcome light on the alleged views of former INM chairman Leslie Buckley towards Davy, INM's house stockbroker.

The court papers deal with the 2016 row that broke out between Buckley and former chief executive Robert Pitt over the price tag of a bid for Newstalk. According to the filing, Pitt told Drennan's office that Buckley pressured him to pay more than the chief executive, as advised by Davy, felt Newstalk was worth.

“It was further alleged by Mr Pitt that [Buckley] said that Davy could be influenced by management to write in their valuation what management told them to write,” the ODCE court papers state.

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According to this account in the court papers, Pitt appears, in effect, to have been alleging that Buckley told him Davy could be easily influenced to change its valuation of Newstalk.

Valuing assets

Davy would likely strongly dispute this alleged assertion by Buckley. But it is still interesting that the then chairman of one of the best-known PLCs in the State allegedly held this view of Davy when it came to valuing assets.

It is also worth noting that, in among the allegations in the affidavit that Buckley may have shared price-sensitive information with Denis O’Brien, there is one eye-opening message in which he supposedly sent him a potentially price-sensitive Davy note on INM, the night before other shareholders got it.

The incident raises questions about the procedures that are in place to ensure the security of market sensitive information.

A lesson to be learned, perhaps?