By Eric King-
Two directors who set-up a group of companies to act as a financial services platform and own a portfolio of financial institutions banned for a total of 29 years after duping investors, and raking up a deficiency of £19m.
Shahram Shoraka 48, (pictured)formerly of North West London and now residing in USA, received the maximum 15-year disqualification order on 26 February 2020 at the High Court of Justice after Judge Jones concluded he had acted with a lack of commercial probity.
Shoraka’s colleague, Peter Herald Irvin Hellman 62, from South West London, had previously had his 14-year disqualification undertaking accepted by the Secretary of State in October 2018. The pair are now banned from acting as a director or becoming involved directly or indirectly, without the permission of the court, in the promotion, formation or management of a company.
Representatives of the Insolvency Service told The Eye Of Media.Com that the scale of the deficiency ranks among one of the highest they have seen. ”The essence of exposing people like this is so that people are aware of that these individuals are not permitted to get involved in any type of business for the 15 and 14 years stated. Investors have to be aware of people like this and spot the signs”.
The court heard that Shahram Shoraka and Peter Hellman were directors of two companies; namely Omada Investment Management Ltd and Omada Holdings Ltd. The two directors intended for the Omada group of companies to become a financial services platform, while also owning a portfolio of institutions, such as banks and insurance companies. They marketed themselves as a company that specialised in asset management and private equity by offering attractive loans at unbeatable rates. Hellman described the business as the ”market’s most straightforward and flexible stock-based lending service”.
His right hand man, also a CEO of the company, Shoraka described their offers as giving companies ”access to a robust and extremely flexible funding option.” Investigators discovered that during 2015, monies were advanced to an associated company within the Omada group from an offshore corporate entity to buy a Maltese bank. The funds were guaranteed by Omada Investment Management and Omada Holdings provided a guarantee but without any formal security.
The monies advanced under the loan agreement came to £4.2 million, plus interest, and was due to be repaid by June 2016. The loan, however was not repaid and this caused the two companies to enter into insolvency proceedings with an overall estimated deficiency of just over £19 million. Administrators were appointed in December 2016, who brought the Omada group of companies to the attention of the Insolvency Service before investigators uncovered that Shahram Shoraka and Peter Hellman had acted with a lack of commercial probity in their business dealings.
As directors of Omada Investment Management, Shoraka and Hellam had secured close to £9.5 million and provided written agreements to investors about how their funds would be invested. Shoraka and Hellam however, used the funds primarily on company expenses, overheads and office refurbishment costs. The pair provided false information to clients about the status of their investments and failed to ring-fence investors’ funds, while also misrepresenting to auditors the assets, liabilities and turnover of the company and submitted inaccurate accounts over three years.
MISCONDUCT
And between July 2013 and February 2017, as directors of Omada Holdings, Shoraka and Hellam carried out further misconduct when they failed to disclose to a client the loss of investment securities worth approximately £500,000. Shoraka and Hellam secured additional investment from the same client but did not adhere to the agreements, instead spending the money primarily to complete the lease on the trading premises. The pair also made misrepresentations to the company’s auditors regarding assets, liabilities and turnover.
UNSCRUPULOUS
Mark Bruce, Chief Investigator for the Insolvency Service, said:
”Shoraka and Hellam were unscrupulous in their behaviour when it came to illicitly securing millions of pounds from their investors, spending the funds on anything but what they had signed-up to. They compounded their misconduct by providing false information and documentation to both investors and their auditors to perpetuate the fraud.
This represents the most serious misconduct and their substantial bans, some of the most restrictive terms that can be applied, will remove these two from the business arena, protecting the public and creditors from further abuse”.