BrisConnections wind-up vote fails after rebel shareholder sells out

Nicholas Bolton, the 26-year-old IT entrepreneur who attempted to wind up toll road company BrisConnections, has shocked the business world by doing a secret deal and voting against his own wind-up resolution.

Bolton’s extraordinary decision was revealed by BrisConnections chairman Trevor Rowe, who fronted a fiery extraordinary shareholders meeting this morning to conduct a vote on whether the company should be wound up.

Documents subsequently lodged with the Australian Securities Exchange revealed Bolton effectively sold the voting rights to his shares to Leighton Holdings, the major contractor working on the road. Leighton then voted Bolton’s shares against the wind-up resolution. Bolton received $4.5 million for selling his voting rights.

Bolton, who established domain name sales company Domain Central in 2003, owns an investment company called Australian Style Investments, which is the largest shareholder in BrisConnections, the company building Brisbane’s $4.9 billion toll road project linking the city and airport.

With BrisConnections units at just 1c, Bolton was able to amass his 19.7% stake for less than $100,000. But he claims that he – like many BrisConnections shareholders – was unaware that each unit holder is required to pay a $2-per-share instalment to BrisConnections over the next 12 months. That meant Bolton faced a debt of $154 million on his shares. 

Bolton called an extraordinary general meeting of the company in the hope of winding up the company to get out of paying the instalments.

It is still unclear whether Bolton’s deal with Leighton relieves him of his debt obligation.

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