This week, the High Court put a stay on the wind-up of Morrogh stockbrokers in Cork to allow receiver Tom Grace have talks with potential investors. No disrespect to Tom Grace, one of the best insolvency men in the State, but it's hard to see any other broker coming to rescue Morrogh from the hands of the liquidator.
What's in it for some corporate coming in to take over Morrogh as an entity? Stockbroking, like a lot of service industries, is a people business and if people walk, a lot of their clients walk with them. If the assets walk out the door with their client list in their pocket, then the takeover of the company has been a waste of time.
Broking sources believe that a far more likely option is that other Irish stockbrokers will simply go out and hire Morrogh's brokers - without the bother of taking over the broking firm. Davy's and Goodbody's are already active in the Cork area through their parent banks and will no doubt be casting avaricious eyes on Morrogh's 9,000 clients - many of them drawn from the great and the good - and the old money of Cork and its environs.
The likely collapse of Morrogh because of the alleged financial dealings of Stephen Pearson is, of course, a tragedy for Alec Morrogh, a scion of the family that gave its name to the stockbroking firm. If no rescuer can be found for Morrogh, then he and Stephen Pearson face a bill running close to £1 million (#1.27 million).
It's not that long ago that Colm O'Briain and Frank Ryan had to cough up more than £500,000 after the collapse of Stokes & Kelly, even though they knew nothing of the activities that convicted fraudster David McKenna was up to. Stokes & Kelly was a partnership where the partners had to dig deep to cover the deficit, and the same will apply to W&R Morrogh.
But it is unlikely that Alec Morrogh's career in stockbroking will come to an end with the demise of W&R Morrogh. He was the main point of contact between the firm and many of its well-heeled clients, and so would be an obvious recruit for any broking firm with eyes on the firm's clients.
