Oliver Curtis, the husband of socialite publicist Roxy Jacenko, has called off plans to float his AI company Firmus on the stock market after its expected valuation plunged by billions of dollars.
Firmus has ambitious plans to build data centres filled with powerful computer chips that can train AI models and power tools such as ChatGPT.
Firmus was set to become Australia’s second-biggest stock market listing behind Telstra, with shares set to be priced at $11 and the company valued at $44 billion.
But its planned October 23 ASX debut was scrapped amid concerns Curtis was being too ‘greedy’ and demanding far more for the company than investors believed it was worth.
‘Having considered recent market volatility and prevailing market conditions, the board determined that the terms on which the offer could proceed would not appropriately reflect the strength of the company’s business and long-term growth outlook,’ the company said.
‘The board therefore concluded that proceeding with the offer was not in the best interests of the company and its shareholders.’
Firmus will now seek fresh funding from wealthy private investors to bankroll its ambitious plans to build AI data centres across Australia and Asia.
The company has already attracted billions of dollars from major US investors, including chipmaking giant Nvidia and investment firm Blackstone.
Firmus had hoped to raise $7.9 billion by Thursday ahead of its planned October 23 stock market debut.
Oliver Curtis (pictured with wife Roxy Jacenko)
One New York hedge fund even raised concerns about Curtis’ insider trading conviction and refused to take part in the planned float.
Firmus has deployed smaller AI computing facilities but has yet to demonstrate it can build and operate hyperscale data centres on the scale underpinning its multibillion-dollar expansion plans.
The pull out of the float comes just months after Curtis marked the ninth anniversary of his release from Cooma Correctional Centre after being granted parole following his conviction for conspiracy to commit insider trading.
Curtis was convicted in June 2016 of conspiring to commit insider trading using confidential information, and served 12 months of a two-year prison sentence.
’20 years ago, I was a young man, a very young man, for that matter,’ Mr Curtis told Rampart’s Joe Aston this year.
‘I was silly, I was stupid, and I made a mistake … If I had my time again, of course I’d do different things, naturally.’
He was found guilty over confidential tip-offs provided by his old school friend John Joseph Hartman.
Hartman was an equities dealer at Orion Asset Management, which managed billions of dollars of investments.
Because of his job, Hartman knew in advance when Orion was planning to buy or sell large amounts of particular shares – and those trades could move the market price.
The court found that Hartman provided Curtis with confidential information about Orion Asset Management’s trading intentions on 45 occasions between May 25, 2007 and June 11, 2008.
Curtis used the tip-offs to make trades before Orion carried out its planned trades.
He was 30 when he was convicted, but the sentencing judge said he was just 21 when he committed the offence.
The duo had been best mates at Saint Ignatius’ College Riverview, the elite private Jesuit boarding school on Sydney’s lower north shore.
Before they were convicted, the pair drank at city bars and made a total of $1.4million from the illegal trades, splashing the proceeds on luxury items and trips.
Hartman, son of the obstetrician to the Packer and Murdoch families, and Curtis, the son of the executive chairman of rare earth miner Lynas, were living together in a $3,000-a-week Bondi apartment at the time.
Hartman bought a $60,000 Mini Cooper and a $20,000 Ducati motorcycle. They took their friends on holidays to gamble in Las Vegas casinos, and paid for strippers at Cirque du Soleil.
They took a helijet from Vancouver to ski in Whistler, Canada because they would be ‘too hungover to drive’.
Even before things came to a head, the old school mates had begun to fall out with one another over money to support their lifestyle and Curtis’ gambling habit.
In August 2008, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission began scrutinising Hartman’s stockbroking account after it detected illegal trading.
On January 13, 2009, Hartman’s broker froze the $2.6m account, making Hartman believe he had been caught red-handed.
Five days later, he rang his father, moved out of the Bondi flat and quit his job. The following day, he confessed everything to ASIC investigators.
Hartman was jailed aged 25 in 2010 and served 15 months in prison, and Curtis’ case finally went to trial in 2016, before he was jailed in 2016.
