We found the cafe owner at the centre of a $500m ASIC fight

 We found the cafe owner at the centre of a $500m ASIC fight By Sarah Danckert and Amilia Rosa

Cafe owner and investment scheme promoter Rashid Alshakshir looks confident as he swings his Bentley Bentayga SUV into the driveway of his Melbourne home. “If you are here to serve me, you can serve me now,” he yells out the window of the car (estimated retail price, somewhere around $375,000) at who he thinks are lawyers attempting to deliver court documents from a legal suit he’s facing.

The Tickled Pink cafe chain proprietor’s mood changes dramatically when he learns that it is a reporter and photographer from this masthead who have come knocking to ask questions about his alleged ties to a failed $500 million investment scheme that is the subject of a major investigation by the corporate watchdog.

“I’m not speaking to you. You’re not interested in the truth. You’re interested in a cheesy story,” he says.

“I don’t answer to you. I answer to ASIC [the Australian Securities and Investments Commission], right? I have answered to ASIC. If they have something more they want from me, they can ask me.”

Alshakshir’s marketing company is alleged to have received $35 million from developer and fund manager Paul Chiodo for delivering investor leads for the $500 million Shield Master Fund, which holds the retirement savings of 6000 Australians.
ASIC launched a major probe amid concerns large sums of investor money was improperly used to fund Chiodo’s ambitious luxury resort developments in Fjij, Port Douglas and K’Gari and to make payments to the scheme’s promoters.
An investigation by this masthead last year uncovered that many of those developments did not have planning permits and that investor money had been used to back Alshakshir’s business on Chiodo’s direction. Chiodo, who operated the Keystone Asset Management group, has strenuously denied any improper dealings of investor funds and has long maintained he is being unfairly targeted by ASIC. 

This masthead spoke with Alshakshir, a former journalism student, after he recently returned from Bali for business reasons.
It was a trip that so concerned the corporate watchdog it rushed to court in late January to stop the 35-year-old from leaving the country. 

Tracking down Rashid Alshakshir

ASIC told the court it believed Alshakshir was a flight risk after learning – via this masthead – that he had shuttered his Melbourne cafes.

The watchdog also told the court that Alshakshir had listed for sale a $3 million home in Essendon in October of last year. Property records show he purchased the property, which has a pool and a built-in basketball court, in June of the same year. The regulator was ultimately unsuccessful in its application, with Justice John Snaden finding – ultimately correctly – that Alshakshir would return to assist ASIC in its investigation and for family reasons.

Snaden’s judgment lifted the lid on the importance of Alshakshir to ASIC’s investigation.
The designs for the ultra luxurious Port Douglas resort being planned for Chiodo where allegedly tens of millions of dollars was spent on a development with no permit and no construction under way. 

The designs for the ultra luxurious Port Douglas resort being planned for Chiodo where allegedly tens of millions of dollars was spent on a development with no permit and no construction under way.

“Given his apparent role in the entities that are the subject of inquiry (or some of them), Mr Alshakshir’s significance to ASIC’s investigation is undoubted,” Snaden said.

“At its core, the investigation concerns the provision by those entities (or some of them) of financial services to people who later invested in a fund that has since failed; and the receipt by at least one of those entities of a significant sum of money from or associated with that fund.” 

This masthead is not suggesting Alshakshir has broken Australian financial services laws, just that ASIC has made allegations in court relating to his business activities. The ASIC investigation could lead to no action being taken against Alshakshir. Likewise, ASIC’s investigation into Chiodo might also not lead to any action being taken against him.
Alshakshir is rapidly downsizing his existing business interests.

Within days of receiving the Federal Court’s reprieve for his nearly thwarted holiday plans, Alshakshir appointed liquidators to the entity NOHAP Pty Ltd, which allegedly received the $35 million in payments from a Chiodo company.
Another business of his was also placed into liquidation in October. 

Together the companies owe creditors $14 million, including more than $5 million to the Australian Tax Office according to company records. 

Liquidator to the collapsed Alshakshir businesses, Laurie Fitzgerald of firm William Buck, says he is investigating the companies’ activities and working with ASIC.

Over in Bali, where investor money has been used to fit out a sleek Tickled Pink cafe, Alshakshir’s business appears to be in abeyance.

When this masthead visited Tickled Pink cafe in Canggu’s popular La Bajo complex it looked abandoned, and dust covered most of the windows.

Tickled Pink cafe in Bali looked abandoned when this masthead visited the property. Inside the cafe from a broken glass window.

Peering through a broken glass window, the venue appeared as it does on social media, with luxe furnishings, but as though it hadn’t been used in several weeks. 

No staff were on site at the cafe, and it seemed as though it had been deserted. Ahmad Syahfitra, general manager for La Bajo complex, confirmed Tickled Pink was still a tenant there.
“Since they suspended operations a few months back, there have been no activities there. No renovation works, nothing. In the last two weeks [since January 23rd], no one from Tickled Pink has visited the place. Staff would have reported something like that to me,” he said.

An influencer who reviewed the venue in October last year who asked not to be named to maintain business relationships, said when they went there during lunch service there were not many guests at the time. Empty chairs at empty tables.

A security guard at the La Bajo complex said he only ever saw the owner when the place first opened, months ago. Whether Alshakshir plans to reopen the business and extend the tenancy of Tickled Pink at the venue is unclear.

It’s another blow for Shield fund investors. Only in December, Chiodo was talking up the Bali investment to this masthead: “Tickled Pink had three thriving businesses in Melbourne and their international strategy in Bali made for it to be a good investment. 

Tickled Pink upon completing the Bali restaurant fitout delivered a $15 million valuation.” 

Back in Melbourne, Alshakshir is firm when he’s speaking with this masthead that he has no comment on the state of his Bali business, the liquidation of two Australian companies or if he thinks ASIC’s investigation is unfounded. 

Rashid Alshakshir confronts a journalist from The Age.
Rashid Alshakshir confronts a journalist from The Age.CREDIT: JUSTIN MCMANUS Asked if he had any message for the investors, Alshakshir says: What does that have to do with me?

“I have nothing to say to you. I would like it if you stop harassing me.”