Ballymore subsidiary sells stake in project to shareholder's wife

A subsidiary of the Ballymore Properties group sold its share in a shopping centre development to the wife of the group's biggest shareholder for €725,000, its latest accounts show.

Returns with the Companies Registration Office (CRO) show that Ballymore Developments Ltd sold its 50 per cent stake in Newbridge Investments Ltd, the developer of the Whitewater shopping centre in Newbridge, Co Kildare, for €725,000 to Bernadine Mulryan in April 2004.

Newbridge Investments was the original joint venture company behind Whitewater. In 2004, it was independently valued at €1.45 million.

It has since been dissolved and the development has been taken over by a number of different companies involving the same individuals.

The centre will be the biggest outside Dublin when it opens this year. According to some reports, it was developed at a cost of €175 million and will create around 500 new jobs.

Mrs Mulryan is the wife of developer Seán Mulryan, who built the centre in a joint venture with Seán Dunne, the principal of Mountbrook Homes who paid a record €260 million for the Jury's Ballsbridge site in Dublin three months ago.

Ballymore Developments is a subsidiary of Ballymore Ireland Ltd, which is incorporated in the Isle of Man. Ballymore Properties, an unlimited company based in the Republic of Ireland, is the ultimate parent. Mr Mulryan controls the group.

Ballymore Developments' accounts show that it had an operating loss of €10,280 in the 12 months to the end of last March.

However, it made profit on the sale of its Newbridge Investments stake of €712,500, which in turn left it with a profit before tax of €702,042. Its profit for the financial year came to €560,193, compared with a loss of €1,000 for the previous 12-month period.Shareholders' funds at March 31st 2005 stood at €936,833, compared with €376,640 a year earlier.