While Australian stock markets rebounded with vigor, and property prices continued to bubble away, Crikey celebrates those who made it all possible, and made 2009 truly a year to remember.
James Packer
Tips and rumours: Tips and rumours: Pricey pud at The Sunday Age‘s Xmas party
The Sunday Age charges its staffers a pretty penny for the company Chrissie bash, Packer and Murdoch Jrs have something on the boil, and the inside word from Telstra.
Only a Senate inquiry can sort out One.Tel mess
Whilst ASIC has received the mother of all beltings in today’s papers for the failure to string up former One.Tel CEO Jodee Rich, more attention should be focused on the role played by Australia’s politicians and the Murdoch and Packer families.
Crikey Says: Packer and Murdoch can’t buy their way out of this one
In throwing out the ASIC case against the One.Tel founders, the NSW Supreme Court demolished the idea that two of Sydney’s richest kids — the Packer heir James and the Murdoch heir Lachlan — were unsuspecting victims of One.Tel management in the failed telco’s boardroom.
Tips and rumours: Tips and rumours: What’s happening in Kabul?
An update on what’s happening in West Kabul, plus the hilarities Hansard captures — no whooping in here, Senator!
Expansive James Packer goes the full half hour
The man who used to like two-minute chairman addresses went on for half-an-hour at yesterday’s Crown AGM, boasting of PBL’s recent performance and making some pre-emptive attacks against the anti-pokies lobby.
Crikey Says: Poor Packer has had a gutful this morning
It was fat puns aplenty at News Limited this morning, with lots of unflattering photos running of rival media mogul James Packer. What point were they trying to make exactly?
Paul Barry and the Packer punch up
What’s Four Corners doing promoting a new tome on James Packer by Paul Barry?
Going gangbusters: the secret to Packer’s Macau success
After struggling initially, Packer’s $3 billion Macau casino venture is finally making headway. The secret: providing credit that no-one else can — overseen by a man with an alleged triad gangster past.
How Telstra split opens up Foxtel ownership
The announcement that Telstra must separate its retail and wholesale division — including a sell-off of its 50% Foxtel stake — should make Consolidated Media a prime takeover target. Let the media mogul battle begin.
Stokes-Murdoch “showdown” a damp squib
It’s back to business as usual in the Australian media, with Stokes and Packer dividing up the juiciest bits of the industry, just as Kerry Packer and Rupert Murdoch did a decade or so ago.
James still stuck in Kerry’s shadow
For most of his life, Kerry Packer had a reputation for being a bit of a Midas when it came to investing. Shame his son James Packer didn’t inherit the same touch.
Will Packer use Stokes to get Rupert’s cash?
If James Packer really doesn’t care to be a media owner these days, then he’ll use stalking Kerry Stokes to lever a big price for his pay-TV assets out of Rupert, writes Stephen Mayne.
James Packer’s giant spring clean out
James Packer appears to be in the middle of a personal and professional cleanout, sparked in part by the global financial crisis. He’s flogged off his horses, boat and stake in Seek, the online classifieds company.
Packer v Stokes: who will be Australia’s last media mogul?
James Packer signalled yesterday he will defeat Kerry Stokes’ bid for Consolidated Media Holdings with “exactly the same technique that Stokes used to painstakingly build his control of Seven”. Terry McCrann explains.
Stokes sits on cash, Packer sells the farm
Which media mogul wins? Reports today show that while the Packer media empire is shrinking, the empire Kerry Stokes is building is sitting on $2 billion of cash and sharemarket investments.
Stokes v Packer: Consolidated Media cage match
It was Kerry Stokes’ turn to up his stake in Consolidated Media yesterday, after James Packer boosted his holding the day before.
Kerry stokes his claim in Packer’s holdings
Channel Seven Chairman Kerry Stokes has upped his stakes in James Packer’s media pie, bringing him just a slice away from a takeover.
The Packer-Stokes war hots up
The dinosaurs are restless again. Australia’s last remaining putative media moguls, “Little” Kerry Stokes and “Big” Kerry’s son James Packer, are locking horns over the rump of the media empire that Kerry Packer built.
BRW’s rich listers lose $25b; still way richer than you
As a group, it seems that the members of the Rich 200 have outperformed the ordinary investor to an impressive degree, writes James Thomson.
BRW Rich List 200: a sneak peek
On Thursday, BRW magazine will release its annual Rich 200 edition, which promises to be one of most fascinating in years. James Thomson provides a sneak peak.
MGM Mirage casino should ‘disengage’ from controversial Pansy Ho
New Jersey gaming regulators have advised that MGM Mirage should be “directed to disengage” from its Macao joint venture partner, Pansy Ho. Where does that leave James Packer?
Packer: Australia’s richest once more
Australia’s richest business people have become progressively poorer in the last year. Andrew Forrest fell from number one in the Top 40 rich list thanks to losses of $5 billion.
Fairfax, AWB and co. bury bad news in the budget build-up
Fairfax Media was in good company yesterday as it tried to hide a sharp profit downgrade under the cloak of the Federal Budget.
