National Finance's Anthony Banbrook sentenced

National Finance director Anthony Banbrook has been sentenced to eight and a half months’ home detention and ordered to pay $75,000 in reparation for misleading the company's investors.

Banbrook, who earlier pleaded guilty to making a false statement in a National Finance prospectus, was sentenced at Auckland High Court this morning.

The charge, brought by the Financial Markets Authority, carried a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment or a fine of up to $300,000.

Banbrook is the last of four National Finance directors to be prosecuted for their part in the firm's collapse.

His sentencing was delayed twice last year, the second time because he tried to blame the firm’s jailed boss, Trevor Ludlow, to lessen his own culpability.

The matter went to a disputed facts hearing.

Under the Securities Act, Banbrook’s conviction means he is automatically banned from managing companies for five years.

The FMA says Banbrook is the 20th finance company director to be sentenced as a result of action taken by FMA.

“While FMA’s successful prosecution of the directors of National Finance does not restore the loss which investors suffered, it sends an important message that those who participate in New Zealand’s capital markets and fail to meet the standards required by law will be held to account," FMA head of enforcement Belinda Moffat says.

Sentencing of other National Finance directors

Carol Braithwaite, the former wife of National Finance's boss and owner Ludlow, was found guilty by a jury and sentenced to 10 months home detention and ordered to do 300 hours of community work for her part in the company’s collapse.

Ludlow was sentenced to six years and four months in jail in October 2011 after being found guilty of false accounting and theft by a person in a special relationship.

The financier's accountant, John Gray, pleaded guilty to theft by a person in a special relationship and one charge of false accounting in November 2010 and was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment, later reduced after an appeal to nine months' home detention.

National Finance invested deposits from the public mainly into car loans, through a network of dealers for the related Payless Cars group.

It was placed into receivership in May 2006.

Some debenture holders have been returned about 49c in the dollar.

gbond@nbr.co.nz