On Tuesday at 8:00 am Whale Oil announced that legal costs had led Cameron Slater “to make the very difficult decision to declare bankruptcy, since he is unable to generate enough passive revenue to fund the three extremely expensive and in his opinion, vexatious, defamation actions against him.”

Slater has followed through on this, with it being adjudicated yesterday on his own petition.

Bankruptcy can be tough, but it can also be a relief to have someone else (the Official Assignee) dealing with your financial problems.

A comment at The Standard yesterday from Redbaiter:

Among all the commentary on this event, there is little information on blogs or in the MSM on how the bankruptcy will effect the Whaleoil blog and its subscribers,

My understanding is that if someone becomes bankrupt then the official assignee takes over all of their affairs. The idea is to ascertain what revenue is available for the creditors.

One assumes the blog is a business, with revenue from subscription and advertising, and it also has some connection with the Whaleoil Meat Company.

So will this “business” be henceforth run by an Administrator appointed by the Official Assignee, and/ or will it be closed down as a loss making enterprise & therefore of no value to creditors?

If it is deemed of value, could it be sold off?

Would guess Slater’s legal team will have done what they could to minimise the effects of his bankruptcy on the blog, but IIRC, the OA can look at what happened in the recent past and reverse any actions taken to hide assets away.

People who have subscriptions to the blog, or are considering renewing them need answers to these questions. Same goes for meat purchasers.

Good points. Readers of Whale Oil don’t appear to have been informed about the implications of the bankruptcy. They were still advertising for subscriptions and trying to sell meat yesterday and again today.

Ownership of various things could take a while to sort out. There have been a number of changes over the last couple of months.

Social Media Consultants Limited

On 22 February 2019 documents were filed with the Companies Register removing Slater as a director and shareholder of Social Media Consultants Limited, effective 1 February 2019.

Juana Atkins (Slater’s wife and apparent manager of the Whale Oil blog, is now sole director and shareholder.

The registered office is shown as Howard K TAYLOR – ACCOUNTANT.

Social Media Consultants Limited is named as second defendant in the Blomfield v Slater defamation. In October a court found that Slater and Social Media Consultants Limited had no credible defence – see What Whale Oil isn’t telling their readers

Whale Meat Company Limited

http://app.companiesoffice.govt.nz/co/7292558

In advertising last year the Whale Oil meat selling venture was described at Whale Meat Company.

On 25 February 2019 Whale Meat Company Limited was registered. Incorporation date 25 February 2019.

Sole director and shareholder is Howard Karl TAYLOR.

From The Whale Meat Company website About:

Whale Meat became a reality when Cam tapped some of his many contacts to help supply meat, set up and run The Whale Meat Company.

You can take advantage of the buying power of Cam and the Oilers and enjoy restaurant quality meat delivered to you, by buying the pack that suits you, when it suits you.

The impression there is that Cam was instrumental in setting up and running the company.

WOHB Limited

http://app.companiesoffice.govt.nz/co/7271736

On 13 February  2019 WOBH Limited was registered, Incorporation date: 13 Feb 2019

Sole director and shareholder Howard Karl TAYLOR.

whaleoil.co.nz

https://www.dnc.org.nz/whois/search?domain_name=whaleoil.co.nz

The domain name was first registered on 2 November 2005.

It was last modified 25 February 2019 11:00 pm

Registrant name: WOBH Limited

However the address remains as Slater’s address, and the contact is sb at whaleoil – aka ‘spanish bride’ and Juana Atkins, Slater’s wife.

…

I expect that the Official Assignee will be looking at some of these ownership changes.

I’m not sure that these various ownership switches are a good way of reducing Slater’s stress.