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From small beginnings as the offshoot of a British merchant bank in 1969, Macquarie has become the world’s largest infrastructure asset manager, a powerful investment bank, a global commodities player and several other things besides. It has built all of this through a distinct culture built on risk management, individual empowerment and a capacity for constant reinvention – but it hasn’t always been popular along the way. A new book by Chris Wright and Joyce Moullakis examines the journey.
It was the transformative decade: radical economic reform, takeover splurges, spectacular busts, the rapid acceleration of Australia’s Asian engagement, and emergence of more companies ready to take on the world.
The cattle-farming family of a hard man in Australia s World War II political leadership have reaped more than $100million with the sale of the huge property he bought in retirement.
Cecil Looker, private secretary to WWII Prime Minister Robert Menzies and later a chief of the Melbourne and Australian Stock Exchanges, bought the 434 hectare Merri Park property at Beveridge, 35km north of Melbourne in 1966.
A hard man with a large chip on his shoulder , Mr Looker relaxed at the property with his wife Jean from 1966, according to the Australian Dictionary of Biography.
In 1968 he hosted Prince Philip at the property, holding displays of boomerang throwing, sheep shearing and dog trials.