Great frauds in history: Alan Bond’s debt-fuelled empire

Alan Bond built an empire that encompassed brewing, mining, television on unsustainable amounts of debt, which led to his downfall and imprisonment.

Alan Bond © Patrick Riviere/Getty Images
(Image credit: © Patrick Riviere/Getty Images)

Alan Bond was born in 1938 in London, and spent his early childhood in Wales before moving to Western Australia with his family at the age of 12. He left school two years later and served part of an apprenticeship as a sign-writer before founding Progress Development Organisation (later Bond Corporation) in 1959, originally to pursue real-estate development. During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, his empire grew to encompass brewing, mining, television and even a private university. In 1983 his sponsorship of the winning Australian team in the America’s Cup later earned him the Order of Australia.

What was the scam?

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Dr Matthew Partridge
Shares editor, MoneyWeek

Matthew graduated from the University of Durham in 2004; he then gained an MSc, followed by a PhD at the London School of Economics.

He has previously written for a wide range of publications, including the Guardian and the Economist, and also helped to run a newsletter on terrorism. He has spent time at Lehman Brothers, Citigroup and the consultancy Lombard Street Research.

Matthew is the author of Superinvestors: Lessons from the greatest investors in history, published by Harriman House, which has been translated into several languages. His second book, Investing Explained: The Accessible Guide to Building an Investment Portfolio, is published by Kogan Page.

As senior writer, he writes the shares and politics & economics pages, as well as weekly Blowing It and Great Frauds in History columns He also writes a fortnightly reviews page and trading tips, as well as regular cover stories and multi-page investment focus features.

Follow Matthew on Twitter: @DrMatthewPartri