KEY POINTS:
Investors owed more than $300 million by OPI Pacific Finance yesterday voted to enter in a "secured debt arrangement" with the failed company's Australian parent Octaviar before today's court hearing in Brisbane that may see Octaviar liquidated.
The arrangement gives OPI Pacific and its investors a better basis for their claims against Octaviar, which include A$300 million ($366 million) to make up losses on loans Octaviar made using OPI Pacific cash.
OPI Pacific said 65 per cent of debenture holders by value voted and 97 per cent were in favour.
Almost 100 per cent of unsecured noteholders who voted were also in favour.
Jeff Staniland of financial advisory Gould Wealth Management, which acquired a large number of OPI Pacific clients when it bought the Vestar business this year, described the decision as "a no brainer".
A more difficult decision for investors is whether to accept Octaviar's offer to buy them out of their OPI Pacific securities, at 22.5c a dollar of the current net value of debenture stock and 15c in the dollar for note holders.
Investors were to have decided on the offer yesterday, but the deadline has been postponed until September 30 to give Octaviar's other major creditors - between them owed about A$560 million - sufficient time to consider a similar offer.
Meanwhile, the Public Trustee of Queensland, which is representing note holders owed A$350 million by Octaviar, begins proceedings in the Supreme Court of Brisbane today in a bid to have Octaviar wound up.
