#Pleasance in CU Amiga
6 messages in this thread
I was just reading in one of those text files that floats around BBS's that
Euro's call… anyways it mentioned that Although some insurance companies are
the biggest creditors to commodore, after them Ali and Mendhi are the next
biggest, also that a dozen companies that commodore is in debt to are also
owned by Ali and Mendhi. It went on to imply that Ali and Mendhi simply threw
Commodore into liquidation because they could milk more money out of the
company that way then had they just sold their interest in an operating
company. I wonder if much of that debt was created near the end of commodore?
I seem to smell some type of fraud or securities scam going on. Good idea to
have the bankrupsy in Bahamas and keep investigators in US out, then have
relatives running the show in the liquidation committee… Hmmmm.
exit
>the biggest creditors to commodore, after them Ali and Mendhi are the next
Not sure what that is meant by "Ali and Mendhi". There's "Mehdi Ali", but
that's the first and last name of one person. Could it perhaps intend to mean
Gould and Ali (Erving Gould and Mehdi Ali)?
>I seem to smell some type of fraud or securities scam going on. Good idea to
>have the bankrupsy in Bahamas and keep investigators in US out, then have
>relatives running the show in the liquidation committee… Hmmmm.
There may have been fraud or scam, but liquidation was held in the Bahamas
simply because that's where Commodore was officially incorporated — years ago.
I believe that's also been Gould's official residence, so he could avoid US
income taxes. So at least in that case you're right about "milking more money".
–apl
I think Gould was largely avoiding Canadian income taxes. He's from Toronto.
His move to the Bahamas goes back over 15 years, although his new house there
is recent. Prior to his move, a large amount of income was avoided using the
"family trust" method (Gould didn't own the stuff, the "family trust",
non-taxable, did).
Although some will debate the ethics, tax avoidance is NOT tax evasion. Tax
avoidance is legal: it's what all of us do, if we can, so that we don't pay
more tax than we need to. When a government says, "We will reduce your taxes
if you do it THIS way", few of us insist on paying more taxes.
–Jim
> I think Gould was largely avoiding Canadian income taxes. He's from Toronto.
Thanks for the reminder — I had forgotten Gould was Canadian. Was he with
Commodore back when they were that office-furniture company?
–apl
Don't know quite how far back Gould goes, but must be quite a ways.
About 1976, I decided that a little company called Commodore made really
well-conceived calculators. So I trundled down to a friendly broker and dug
out data for this unlisted company, JUST moved from Canada to the Bahamas.
At that time, the major stockholder was the Gould Family Trust, which didn't
mean a thing to me then.
I never did buy stock. What a roller-coaster ride I would have had if I had
done so!
–Jim
As a Canadian, I tried to forget Gould was Canadian, too! *8^)
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