Anyone watching the grand finale of Ten's modest ratings booster, Masterchef, would have noticed that one of its presenters, Matt Preston, has taken to spruiking financial comparison site, Canstar, in the ad breaks - alongside his rum commercials. 

"We expertly assess thousands of products based on both price and features to derive expert value ratings in a way that is similar to how Matt expertly critiques food on flavour and presentation," said the press release announcing its tie up with Matt as a brand ambassador.

So who thought Matt's decisive role in the one-point win to Diana Chan was a little err, ripe? 

"Matt - no way - that 9 was dodge. Tibballs is the pro - if she says 8 , it was an 8," tweeted Sydney barrister, Maria Gerace, whose work in the legal area of fraud and corruption includes a starring role in the child abuse royal commission. 

Tibballs is a reference to Kirsten Tibballs, the chef who created - and helped judge - the tortuous desert for the finale. She did not rate Chan's efforts as highly as Preston.

Not that Matt needs to worry. As far as CBD can tell, Gerace deleted the tweet so it doesn't look like she is planning to press Preston on the matter.

Holding Court 

Embattled cattle exporter Wellard Ltd was already in dire shape before the ASX decided to have a bash - forcing the company to issue a reply on Tuesday to its 'please explain' notice regarding its downgrade disaster last week which sent the share price crashing 38 per cent. 

The downgrade included a never-before-mentioned voyage of doom to South America that generated a loss of up to $10 million last financial year.  But not everyone has been sitting back and crying about their losses. 

Paul Holmes a Court, son of corporate raider Robert Holmes a Court, used the record low of 12 cents to build his stake to 11.4 per cent. Watch this space. 

Autocorrect 

Someone from Stockspot finally got back to CBD to explain the exact nature of the bromance between the robo advisor's founder, Chris Brycki, and former Wallabies captain Stirling Mortlock. 

CBD was told that Mortlock, in his role as a partner at the mysterious Peak Advisor, is consulting for Brycki at Stockspot "to help us lead our Partnership Program". 

Feeling sheepish?

Every family has its black sheep, and the kinsfolk of our top corporate cop, ASIC chairman Greg Medcraft, are no different. 

On Tuesday, ASIC announced that Financial Choice - founded and run by Greg's cousin, Russell Medcraft - was pinged not once, but twice for "making misleading representations in marketing emails sent to consumers and on its website". 

The first infringement related to emails sent to 215,000 consumers in 2016 that "falsely stated" that the financial advice group had been asked by the consumers' super fund to conduct a survey. 

The other was related to representations made on one of the group's websites, findmysuper.com.au, which allegedly led consumers to believe they needed to use Financial Choice's services to find their lost super, and also to maintain contact with the super fund while overseas. 

Given that Greg had recused himself from the matter, it was left to his deputy, Peter Kell, to deliver the punishment. 

"Consumers can be heavily influenced by promotional materials published by financial services providers. For this reason, ASIC will continue to take action where we believe those materials are misleading. Firms must ensure their marketing materials and promotional statements are based on fact."

The tricky bit for Russell is not the $21,600 fine. It is the fact that ASX-listed financial group Spring FG Ltd announced in March that it planned to acquire Financial Choice for up to $4.8 million, depending on the performance of the new business. 

Settlement was due to take place in April, subject to due diligence.

According to an ASX announcement in June, Spring has managed to raise the cash component of the acquisition fee, but it looks like the two parties have dragged their feet on actually consumating the deal. 

"The acquisition remains subject to satisfactory completion of financial and operational due diligence which is ongoing," said Spring. ​

"We will not be making a statement about the penalty notice," a Spring spokeswoman said in reply to CBD's enquiries. "All enquires should be directed to Russell Medcraft." 

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