The wife of Hanover Finance boss Mark Hotchin has hit back at the media for portraying her as selfish, saying, "I do care that investors have lost money".
Amanda Hotchin's statement comes after a series of reports detailed the Hotchins' luxury lifestyle in a Gold Coast mansion - including seeking access to a Porsche and a $7000-a-week allowance. The high life continues despite Hanover's collapse, which left 16,500 investors, many of them elderly, out of pocket.
Mr Hotchin, with Hanover co-founder Eric Watson, took $91 million in dividends before the collapse, and he owns an incomplete $30 million mansion on Auckland's poshest street, Paritai Drive, a $13.5 million farm and holiday home on Waiheke Island, sections at Jacks Pt near Queenstown, a 69ha Coromandel farm and a prize racehorse.
In an email to media commentator Brian Edwards, published on his blog, Mrs Hotchin says she is not as she has been portrayed - "absolutely selfish, lacking in conscience and indifferent to the welfare of others".
"I care very much about what has happened, I do care that investors have lost money, I am concerned for their welfare."
Excuse our scepticism. If Mrs Hotchin REALLY cared, she would persuade her husband to abandon their $6700-a-week lifestyle on the Gold Coast, return to Auckland, and do something tangible for those for whom she purports to care (for the record, $6700 per week equates to an AFTER-TAX income of $348,400 per annum).
The Hotchins may indeed have been stung by the criticism of their lifestyle. Sometimes the truth does that. Amanda Hotchin may not have chosen her husband's methods of building wealth for the family, but she certainly does not seem to have been active in curbing his spending. Time will tell is she is genuinely distressed about the plight of almost 17,000 Hanover investors, or whether the tears she is crying are of the crocodile variety.
7 comments:
This would definitely appear to be a PR stunt by the Hotchins...it is interesting that Mr. has not bothered to make any public comments but lets his wife cry crocodile tears. Sorry guys...I for one am certainly not buying it.
FWIW I think the Hotchins deserve what's coming to them. If they have broken laws in their fleecing of investors (and taking $19 million in dividends from a collapsing company certainly doesn't seem kosher, they should lose the lot. Watson too, although he spirited his assets away years ago.
One thing Mandy's correct on though, is the lies and smears of the MSM. The tears may well be of the crocodile variety, but that doesn't change the thrust of her message: Jonathon Marshall Lied. Surprise, surprise. And further surprise, stuff.co.nz, while carrying a non-story about the email and dog-whistling again about them living it large, did not mention that Mandy said the Marshall quote was a total fabrication (and she has affidavits from disinterested parties in her support).
So, while I have no sympathy for the Hotchins, I do concur with her that getting your information from the MSM is a fool's errand.
Poor love...she needs to request an increase to that paltry allowance to cover some much-needed trauma counselling.
Good post inventory. In a nutshell
If it was a PR stunt it was badly handled. Brian Edwards would have been the last person I would have thought to use for a case like this. it's an awful spin and she would have been better advised to refrain from any public comment. The Hotchin brand is so badly damaged that nothing can save it. Note to that the Herald ran the image from the Herald on Sunday's gossip section - just the exact kind of image you do not want used.
Do I see a Tui Billboard coming up?
Amanda Hotchin cares. yeah right!
Great minds think alike Michael, see PMofNZ.
Gnatt guy would be just ahead of msm as a source to be rejected out of hand. Fool's errand indeed.
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