David Rowland (property developer)

David Rowland
Born	David John Rowland 16 June 1945 (1945-06-16) (age 66)[1]
Nationality	British
Known for	millionaire property developer/appointment as Conservative Party Treasurer

David Rowland (born 1945) is a British millionaire property developer living in Guernsey and was, for a brief time in 2010, named as the person who would become Treasurer to the Conservative Party.^[2]

Early life

Born in 1945, the son of a scrap metal dealer, David Rowland left the comprehensive Glastonbury School in Morden, South London at the age of 15.^[3] Working as an office boy, he bought and sold property (the first when he was 18), and eventually formed his own property company (Fordham). At the age of 23 he became a millionaire and floated Fordham on the Stock Exchange a year later.

Property career

Rowland took over other groups, issuing shares in his own company to pay for acquisitions. Eventually he sold his stake in Fordham for £2.4m in 1970, and moved to France.

Over the following years he launched bids for Williams Hudson (a company involved in shipping, wharves and warehouses on the Thames); the timber group Venesta International and his company Inoco built up a stake in the oil firm Petranel in an attempt to gain control.^[4]

In 1988, Rowland helped fund a lawyer, David Duff, in a takeover of Edinburgh Hibernian, parent company of Scottish Premier Division football club Hibernian. Eventually the company went into receivership.^[5]

In 1989 Rowland bought a controlling interest (34%) from the Barclay brothers in the company Gulf Resources & Chemical Corporation.^[6] In 1991, Rowland sold his controlling interest to Nycal Corporation.^[7] Over the following years, Gulf resorted to the American courts to recover company monies they alleged were spent by David Rowland, firstly via the courts^[8] and then via their insurance company.^[9] One case was settled (though no financial settlement was deemed necessary), while Gulf lost another.

In 2009, In 2009, Kaupthing Bank, affected by the global liquidity squeeze was divided into two entities, a ‘good, healthy’ bank and a ‘bad’ bank. David Rowland and his son Jonathan, via their investment company Blackfish Capital, acquired and recapitalized the former and now manage the assets, on behalf of the interbank creditors, of the latter. .^[10]

Conservative Party

In 2009 David Rowland moved from Guernsey to England so that he could donate money to the Conservative Party. He donated £3m, making him the party’s major donor.^[11]

On 25 June 2010, Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ) announced that David Rowland would take over as Conservative Party Treasurer in that autumn. ^{[12] [13]}

The Daily Mail ran a series of articles about him during the following months – which culminated in his decision on 19 August 2010 not to become the Conservative Party's Treasurer.^{[3][4][14][15][16]}

Later that month David Rowland made another donation of £1million to the Conservative Party.^[17]

References

1. ^ Companies House
2. ^ The Tory Diary website
3. ^ ^{a b} Pierce, Andrew (10 July 2010). "Revealed: The dirty past of the former tax exile who's the new Tory Treasurer". Daily Mail. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1293533/Revealed-The-dirty-past-tax-exile-whos-new-Tory-Treasurer.html. Retrieved 14 June 2011. 
4. ^ ^{a b} Andrew Pierce, Richard Pendlebury and Ben Laurance (5 August 2010). "The shady City past and friendship with Air Miles Andy of new Tory treasurer". Daily Mail. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1297279/The-shady-City-past-friendship-Air-Miles-Andy-new-Tory-treasurer.html. Retrieved 14 June 2011. 
5. ^ Sport.Scotsman.com – Hibs chairman’s revolution ended in club being open to hostile bid
6. ^ GRCC completes stock sale
7. ^ Washington Business Journal - Nycal tries to swallow firm 8 times its size
8. ^ Gulf USA vs. David Rowland 1997/8
9. ^ Gulf USA vs. Federal Insurance 2001
10. ^ The Telegraph - Rowland family open new bank – 13 July 2009
11. ^ Sigrun Davidsdottir (Icelandic journalist) article
12. ^ The Tory Diary website
13. ^ Daily Mail – David Rowland new Tory treasurer (26 June 2010)
14. ^ Daily Mail – The new Tory treasurer with a blonde – 7 August 2010
15. ^ Daily Mail – Tax exile, ‘shady financier’ – 20 August 2010
16. ^ Daily Mail – Tories lose their tainted treasurer – 20 August 2010
17. ^ The Time – David Rowland gives more than 1m to Conservative Party – 27 August 2010

External links

• Time Magazine (1968) - Gulf Resources & Chemical Corp. background

Persondata
Name	Rowland, David
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	16 June 1945
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death