Good evening,

Investors are keeping a close watching brief on Panthera Finance, one of the country’s biggest debt collectors and under investigation by Victoria’s consumer affairs regulator.

Street Talk understands Panthera’s long-time adviser, Grant Samuel, has been advising the company’s owners on ways to unlock value, including potential divestments across its autofinance book and other debt ledgers. The company collects debts owned by customers of banks, utility companies, telcos, buy now, pay later providers and other lenders.

Sources said while Grant Samuel was not formally mandated and a process was not under way, it had kept close to the founders after running a debt refinancing in 2022 that ended with Brookfield Special Investments tipping in $150 million to replace an existing lender syndicate.

“Panthera has no plans to raise equity or debt after securing a five-year $150 million debt facility from Brookfield in late 2022 ... [We] are not working with Grant Samuel on any transaction at the moment,” a company spokesperson said.

Panthera went from rapid growth – revenue rose from $51.5 million in the 2016 financial year to $81.5 million in 2018 – to the opposite.

In the 2022 financial year, the most recent period for which accounts are available, Panthera Finance Pty Ltd’s revenue tumbled 55 per cent from $61.4 million as expectations of lifetime credit losses on its purchased debt ledger books snowballed into a $40.3 million impairment charge.

At June 30 that year, current liabilities outstripped current assets at $76.4 million to $67.2 million. It was against this backdrop that Brookfield became a lender in October 2022.

It is unclear how Panthera has performed financially in the 18 months since.

Although Brookfield helped stabilised the company, its troubles have continued. As reported by The Australian Financial Review, Consumer Affairs Victoria is investigating Panthera for operating in the state under a different entity despite a five-year ban imposed in 2020 for using “undue harassment” in collecting debts.

The company’s response was the banned entity was a “separate legal entity that operates under its own credit licence”.

Read the full story tomorrow and more on the Street Talk page.

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