Keldia Printings fall into administration has left unsecured trade creditors with debts of around 2m, with paper merchant Dixon & Roe owed 477,000 and Premier Paper in for 347,000.

The full extent of the firms problems and debts has been revealed in a report to creditors from administrators at Hacker Young (PrintWeek, 6 July).

NatWest, Lloyds Bank and Bibby Factors owed 995,000 as of 18 June are secured creditors.

But Hacker Young estimates it could only raise just over 1m from a forced sale of fixed assets, leaving a total shortfall of almost 4.5m.

Joint administrator Andrew Andronikou is speaking to two or three parties from within the industry that are interested in buying the firm or investing in it.

The firm needs investment, he said. He stressed that the Walthamstow firm was trading profitably.

Andronikou continues to investigate the MBO from former owner Tony Diamond last year, led by former sales and marketing director Tony Foo (PrintWeek, 21 July 2000).

The report said: We are surprised that the transaction may have left the company insolvent and hence precipitated its failure.

It revealed that under the terms of the MBO, Foo and his team paid 1.3m in cash and 700,000 in preference shares to Diamond.

He, in return, received the firms freehold property for a consideration of 650,000, which was not paid in cash but appeared to be set off against the MBO transactions 1.95m value.

However, the firms audited accounts for the year to 30 June 2000, which were signed off in September 2000 a month after the MBO was completed listed the freehold as an asset worth 650,000 without a post-MBO explanation. An expert advisor is now close to completing a report into the firms fall into administration.

Creditors will be given a chance to sanction the advisors report at a meeting next Friday (28 September), where Andronikou will seek approval for the administrators proposals.

Story by Gordon Carson