Eddie Hobbs new Brendan Investments vehicle

[McVittie]

People are entitled to their good name and this entitlement is protected by law.

In my opinion the contents of some posts contain innuendo bordering on defamation. Such innuendo is not something that should be tolerated in any public forum. Regrettably it is being tolerated in this thread and an associated thread.

The owner of this site should publish clear unambiguous guidelines for posters and ensure effective compliance.

 

[Sunny]

People are entitled to their good name and this entitlement is protected by law.

In my opinion the contents of some posts contain innuendo bordering on defamation. Such innuendo is not something that should be tolerated in any public forum. Regrettably it is being tolerated in this thread and an associated thread.

The owner of this site should publish clear unambiguous guidelines for posters and ensure effective compliance.

Doesn't the name Converse2007 actually have to exist before it can be a victim of defamation. Not having a go by the way. Just wondering.

 

[Brendan Burgess]

As this thread is getting longer and longer, I would like to remind readers of the following:

(a) The only people posting repeatedly and enthusiastically in favour of Brendan Investments are newly-registered users Mantus, Refer, converse2007, Riddler and Vanuatu. And now gomahawk seems to have joined in as well.
(b) They all seem to have detailed knowledge of Brendan Investments, beyond that available to the general public. They have consistently dismissed, fudged or ignored any criticisms levelled at the product itself or the manner of its promotion. They all deny any association with Brendan Investments and some of them accuse other posters of having a vested interest in talking it down and/or of defaming Eddie Hobbs in some way.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

In my opinion the contents of some posts contain innuendo bordering on defamation.

I have to agree. The anti lobby have by and large concentrated on the facts, since these provide more than ample fodder to make the case.

The Hydra which supports BI, on the other hand, is unable to counter the objective arguments with like but reverts to personalised attacks accusing hidden agendas, innuendo, defamation etc.

 

[DrMoriarty]

No doubt now I'll be banned for exposing the glaring weakness of AAM. To be frank I really couldn't care less if a bunch of anonymous people want to engage in this type of so-called analysis. My only concern is that some inexperienced or lazy journalist might mistake much of the material as real analysis and quote "expert sources within the industry" rather than "the same nameless cranks over and over again on a website with nothing better to do most of the time, some of whom lead such sad existences they've posted tens of thousands of times". Am I banned now?

You can take your case to open public debate and out of this cesspit any time you like. You can also go to the Regulator again, although I suspect your credibility runs short there.

If you believe that there is mis-selling say so now. Charge the directors of this company now and be prepared to defend yourself for doing so. In other words Brendan put up or shut up.

AAM is anonymous, open to competitive undermining and is badly slanted. Much of it, except for simple stuff like mortgages, deposits etc is plainly wrong, posted by a narrow group of opinionated website junkies...

Is this the kind of innuendo you mean, Ma Converse2007? I'll grant you it breaks several of the posting guidelines...

 

[LDFerguson]

Brendan queries posts but removes my post in GREAT DEBATES in connection with his difficulties with IFSRA. Is it because Brendan's extreme views as expressed in his book like telling investors to avoid property as an investment altogether and put 100% of your cash into the top 10 ISEQ stocks, or his fixation on absolute costs which saw him tell investors to go 100% into the defunct Equitable Life, has finally worn out IFSRA's patience?

Or maybe Converse2007 is referring to this?

 

[McVittie]

A few definitions that may be useful :

"An innuendo is a defamatory imputation whereby the facts known to the reader import into the words some secondary meaning as an addition to, or alteration of, their ordinary meaning."

"Defamation is committed by the wrongful publication of a false statement about a person which tends to lower that person in the eyes of right-thinking members of society or tends to hold that person up to hatred, ridicule or contempt or causes that person to be shunned or avoided by right-thinking members of society."

The again Dr M you may know of these already ?

 

[DrMoriarty]

Indeed.

I was interested in surfacing the hidden motivations behind the text.

 

[Gomahawk]

It is said that those posting positively about BI are fudging, but fudging what? So far there has been no fudge. This is simply untrue. Each of the criticism raised has been been outweighed by counter argument and much of it has been seen to be wrong.

1. First there was the argument that 1% pa was high, but no proper benchmark was used. Instead critics relied initially on the Augustus fund which has a background take out up front of over 11% of the capital raised - that failed obviously.

2. Then in the great anti-property preachers summary, Brendan relied upon an ungeared Hibernian Life fund and pooh poohed criticism that this was false. Finally the truth emerged when its geared European Residential fund was found to have much higher annual charges than BI.

3. Some critics have resorted to mathematical summersaults like magnifying the 1% pa of the gross asset value four fold by reversing the gearing. This is mathematically accurate but absurd. By that measure the upfront costs and annual running costs of a residential investment unit bought with 100% debt is infinity. A 10% equity means that common folk should refer to stamp duty at 90% and annual running costs for ESB, Insurance, Maintenance and rent management at, probaby 70% to 90% of equity.

4. Criticism of costs has been conducted in a vacuum. Nobody has suggested what the costs should be if there is no commission upfront. When the acid test of quoted PLC costs with examples given where annual costs are at least 75% higher, this is dismissed as invalid.

5. The 20% profit share above 8% is attacked as unprecedented but when other examples are given like the Bank of Ire Newgrange Fund with a hurdle of 7% pa, 3% upfront and annual costs of 1.5% this is also dismissed.

6.BI is attacked for not having "household names", despite the fact that three of its directors have over €1.6 bn of property projects under their belts and are qualified individuals. The facts are that, other than politically active developers and tax evaders, few highly experienced property experts are household names. It is a circular argument as a piece of criticism.

7. There isn't definitive properties identified is another criticism, but BI has stated that its is in due diligence on over €100 m of German property and is joining a JV on a five star hotel and 160 appartments in an F1 track and technology park in the Algarve.

8. Media critics like Ross has completely written off property including in Germany stating that " the property game is over" while also stating that "we know little about continental property".

That last comment sums up much of the criticism on this thread, ill-informed, inaccurate and misleading. If it hadn't been for the counterpoints people reading this thread could assume that you actually knew something about the operating costs of a property plc or property itself. Finally on the question of identity, let the nameless industry critics reveal themselves and so will I, until then you'll just have to put up with your arguments being challenged and found erroneous.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

3. By that measure the upfront costs and annual running costs of a residential investment unit bought with 100% debt is infinity. A 10% equity means that common folk should refer to stamp duty at 90% and annual running costs for ESB, Insurance, Maintenance and rent management at, probaby 70% to 90% of equity.

I have been waiting the chance to prove the absolutely absurdity of this argument. But first I note that Himself has used this argument in the press - He surely knows its absurdity, but has got at least one journo to buy.

Next sighting is in this thread by Riddler who states that he is a close friend of Himself.

Now this new manifestation of the Hydra tries it again.

I presume the putative example is of a person buying a house for, say, 1M with a 910K mortgage, paying 90K stamp duty.

Let's ask a few questions:

Buyer, how much will that house cost you? Answer: 1M plus interest on my mortgage, certainly not 90K.

Buyer, why are you paying that much? Answer: because I am going to enjoy living in that house, it is worth 1M to me.

Estate agent (who also arranged the mortgage), how much did you charge the buyer? Answer 1M, no way is he going to argue that he got the buyer a 1M house for 90K.

The key thing is the buyer is consuming 1M worth of goods with the assistance of a mortgage. The mortgage is purely a cash flow facilitator.

The ridiculous comparison of this situation with geared property investment is a dishonest fudge of the highest order. Sorry, let me retract, it is just possible that those making this comparison actually believe it - though I don't know which is the worst defamation "fudge" or "stupidity"?

 

[LDFerguson]

I do like Harchibald's reference to the pro-BI crowd as The Hydra, so I'm going to borrow it here.

2. Then in the great anti-property preachers summary, Brendan relied upon an ungeared Hibernian Life fund and pooh poohed criticism that this was false. Finally the truth emerged when its geared European Residential fund was found to have much higher annual charges than BI.

BB's summary referred to the Hibernian Commercial Property Fund. The Hydra countered with the Residential Fund. When this was clarified, Hydra opined that comparison of a geared and an ungeared fund was invalid, but later used comparisons with hedge funds and the Newgrange fund which has a minimum investment of millions. Talk about invalid comparisons!

3. Some critics have resorted to mathematical summersaults like magnifying the 1% pa of the gross asset value four fold by reversing the gearing. This is mathematically accurate but absurd. By that measure the upfront costs and annual running costs of a residential investment unit bought with 100% debt is infinity. A 10% equity means that common folk should refer to stamp duty at 90% and annual running costs for ESB, Insurance, Maintenance and rent management at, probaby 70% to 90% of equity.

If I invest €100,000 and the promoters take €4,000 per year, that's 4% of invested funds. Since when is that a mathematical somersault?

Nobody has suggested what the costs should be if there is no commission upfront.

The "no commission upfront" argument is a red herring. Commission pays for financial advice. There's no financial advice with this product.

5. The 20% profit share above 8% is attacked as unprecedented but when other examples are given like the Bank of Ire Newgrange Fund with a hurdle of 7% pa, 3% upfront and annual costs of 1.5% this is also dismissed.

Gonk has already blown this argument away earlier. A concentrated equity fund with a €5 million minimum investment. Did someone say "invalid comparison"?

6.BI is attacked for not having "household names", despite the fact that three of its directors have over €1.6 bn of property projects under their belts and are qualified individuals. The facts are that, other than politically active developers and tax evaders, few highly experienced property experts are household names. It is a circular argument as a piece of criticism.

Who asked for household names? What I'm curious about is why BI is so keen on publicising the size of projects that the founders have been involved with, but doesn't publish details of what their track record of actually making money on projects has been. The Hydra said that this information is given out at the roadshows. Why not on the website?

7. There isn't definitive properties identified is another criticism, but BI has stated that its is in due diligence on over €100 m of German property and is joining a JV on a five star hotel and 160 appartments in an F1 track and technology park in the Algarve.

Again, why can't I find this very pertinent information on the website?

What happens if the fund raises €250M and gears up on that?

Finally on the question of identity, let the nameless industry critics reveal themselves and so will I, until then you'll just have to put up with your arguments being challenged and found erroneous.

I have no interest in identifying posters who choose anonymity. But if, for example, a hypothetical anonymous poster was claiming to be nothing more than an investor when s/he really was connected with the investment vehicle s/he was praising, that would be pathetic and would smack of desperation. Would you agree?

 

[MichaelDes]

This thread is beginning to remind me of [broken link removed] it's circular and boring at this stage.

 

[gonk]

1. First there was the argument that 1% pa was high, but no proper benchmark was used. Instead critics relied initially on the Augustus fund which has a background take out up front of over 11% of the capital raised - that failed obviously.

Gomahawk/Mantus/Converse2007/Refer already knows this very well, but I'll repeat for the benefit of new readers who don't have time to trawl through the entire thread.

The 11% of capital referred to above includes costs which BI will also incur, but can't quantify because it has no detailed project plans far enough advanced to provide any written information on. These costs include things like stamp duty (this alone is 3.5%), legal costs, and fees for professional advice.

The only reason Gomahawk is able to make this wholly spurious point is because Augusta, unlike BI, actually has a plan which it has put in writing for prospective investors, including all costs.

BI has acknowledged in its prospectus it will incur similar costs but hasn't given any estimate for the total amount.

 

[LDFerguson]

And so within two hours 7 out of 8 of Gomahawk's arguments have been taken apart, and the 8th could only be answered by Shane Ross.

 

[gonk]

I think it is telling that there is a section headed "Press" on the BI website, where presumably it was intended to post copies of the good reviews the product was expected to receive.

.....

Shortly after the launch they did reproduce on the website an Evening Herald article in which Hobbs was quoted as saying he could quadruple investors' money. This attracted criticism from other papers and it was subsequently removed. Other than this article, any other press coverage I have seen has been at best lukewarm about the investment - much has been negative.

I notice there are now a few press articles reproduced on the website since I wrote the above this morning.

Rather laughably, one is this interview with Vincent Regan in the Sunday Business Post of 30 September.

[broken link removed]

It contains no analysis, just a Q&A with Mr Regan who puts his point of view - fair enough, as far as it goes. But surprise, surprise, this article in the same issue of the Business Post is not reproduced:

[broken link removed]

It's an analysis by specialist property investment writer Diarmaid Condon, which includes comments such as:

"There have been almost 3,000 downloads of the application form on its own, which would suggest that large numbers intend to invest without reading the prospectus.

This is added to concerns that the low entry level for the scheme would attract investors who really shouldn’t, and probably couldn’t, consider such investments under normal circumstances."

and:

"There is also a performance bonus payment , which amounts to 20 per cent of any gains in excess of 8 per cent growth in the fund per annum.

This charge looks somewhat high, considering that most top quality syndicates work off a base of around 15 per cent - although some property funds do levy a charge on gains as low as 7 per cent."

finally concluding:

"Brendan Burgess of the financial forum AskAboutMoney.com is not a proponent of the product. He feels that the claims of potential profits being made are excessive.

He also feels that the charges are excessive, and that the risk level is very high for such low level investors. The option to borrow in Ireland to invest in an already highly-geared company has also come in for some criticism from Burgess."

As for the lukewarm reception in other press coverage, I see another piece reproduced is a review by Jane Suiter in the Sindo, which gives the product a bare pass, scoring it 5 out of 10. BI must be desperate!

 

[gonk]

I genuinely started this thread five weeks ago with an open mind. I believed then and I believe now that European Commercial Property has a place in a diversified portfolio. And that's not a euphemism, Brendan. If I'm constructing a portfolio today for a client with a long-term view, European Commercial Property will be in there in my recommendations.

That said, I've gone off BI since this thread started

In case you don't know Liam, in one of the press articles reproduced on the BI website, from the Sunday Tribune, you are quoted as endorsing the investment:

'Adviser Liam Ferguson (www. ferga. com) would also recommend it "as part of a diversified portfolio. . .The management team are experienced property investment professionals and the prospects for property in the regions they propose to invest in (Germany, the UK and Portugal) are generally considered to be good.'

[broken link removed]

 

[LDFerguson]

That said, I've gone off BI since this thread started, driven in part but not entirely by some of the analysis in this thread and elsewhere.

Thanks for pointing out the link Gonk.

 

[Gomahawk]

The facts I've raised have not been countered at all by the above. You still can't get passed the quoted PLC higher cost issue, the sales commission kick back and bank arrangement fee kickback in the Augusta fund and that BB is a serial property hater - clear from his thome.

The final irony is that Liam Ferguson afaik is not authorised by IFSRA to give advice on shares in a plc and neither, presumably, are any of the critics here. Liam is a restricted intermediary, that means, generally limited advice on life office products. Gonk is an industry person with a strong link to Augusta but I'm presuming he too does not have the IFRSA license or competance recognition to advise. BB is similar and is not authorised. Archibald has engaged in defamation already and has been edited and seems to have a particular bug about at least one of the promoters.

A sorry lot imho to be dishing out "advice" when none of you are actually authorised and, by extension recognised as having the competance to do so.

 

[ClubMan]

is not authorised by IFSRA to give advice on

While [broken link removed] not authorised/regulated by IFSRA at all?

Prospective investors should note that Brendan Investments Pan European Property plc (trading as Brendan Investments) is not regulated by the Financial Regulator or the Irish Stock Exchange.

 

[ubiquitous]

... is not authorised by IFSRA to give advice on ....

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