Fyffes €85m insider trading action against DCC and its chief executive Jim Flavin is set to move to a new home.
The civil case, which is expected to run into June and beyond, is to relocate from court 12 in the Chancery court and reconvene, on Tuesday, in the building used for the Barr tribunal.
The move will allow the legal teams to store all their documents in one place for the duration of the action, while court 12 is used for other cases at present, necessitating the removal of cartloads of paper every week.
So far, although the case is about to enter its 16th day, only one witness of the expected 40 has completed his evidence after David McCann, Fyffes chief executive stood down on Friday.
He told the court the stock exchange did not use the words “true” and “honest” as yardsticks for fulfilment of obligations by public companies and the important thing was to comply with the obligations of a listed entity. Fyffes, he maintained, had always done this scrupulously.
The next witness, Jimmy Tolan, an executive director of Fyffes will be the main focus of attention in the coming days.
On Friday, echoing the McCann, when asked whether the words true or accurate could be applied to an outlook statement on the company’s prospects, Tolan said it was similar to asking if there was any truth in the statement it would rain in three months’ time. It could only be a best guess.
Tolan also held the company line about the importance of bananas to the business. It says the fruit accounted for about 27 per cent of sales in 1998 but for 75 per cent of profits. He said the division had suffered a downturn the following year and that Flavin had been well aware of this.
The case continues.
