Roche family nets €39.6m windfall through NTR payout

Irish businessman Tom Roche and his immediate family are set to net a windfall of about €39.6 million from a proposed special payout to shareholders by long-established investment group NTR.

NTR announced yesterday that, subject to approval from shareholders and the High Court, it will distribute €100 million to its investors from its share capital.

Given that they own just under 40 per cent of NTR, Mr Roche, who is NTR’s chairman, and his family will be the biggest beneficiaries of the payout.

In the boom years, Mr Roche and his wife, Ann Doyle, a daughter of legendary hotelier PV Doyle, appeared to have the Midas touch when it came to their investments.

Following the sale of energy group Airtricity and the West-Link toll bridge by NTR in 2008, the family received €118 million before tax in a special dividend.

Mr Roche owns 3.26 million shares in NTR personally while the family holds a 38.31 per cent stake through an investment vehicle called Dreamport Ltd. Up to 2011, NTR paid out healthy dividends to the family each year, most recently €5.7 million in 2010 via Dreamport.

Mr Roche and Ms Doyle also benefited from windfalls achieved from the sale of various high-profile assets of the former Jurys Doyle hotel chain.

Members of the Doyle and Beatty families took control of the Jurys Doyle group at the height of the boom. The company then netted almost €1.9 billion from the sale of a number of key assets.

The special payout by NTR is part of a planned liquidity event by the company, which has scaled back its investments in recent years and exited a number of unprofitable ventures.

In 2007, the stake owned by Mr Roche and his immediate family was valued at €520 million. That holding is now worth about €55 million on the grey market after the crash of the economy and its trading difficulties.