Founders of collapsed financial advisory firm Storm Financial have hit out against ASIC over the regulator's claims there was not a proper basis for a payment of $2 million to be passed on to them.
ASIC won a court order last week freezing the $2 million payment to Storm founders Emmanuel and Julie Cassimatis.
"At the time the $2 million everyone is talking about was paid to us, Storm had a further $5 million still in the bank," Emmanuel Cassimatis said.
"ASIC have no basis to conclude we did anything untoward.
"It has not been proven that the $2 million was anything other than what it was - a correctly paid dividend. We intend to prove this unequivocally at the court hearing on the 18 February."
As well as refuting ASIC's claim, Cassimatis said the affidavits ASIC relied on to freeze the payment contained factually incorrect information.
"Mr Bill Buckby from Korda Mentha and Ms Davies from Storm have confirmed that parts of information in the affidavits ASIC relied on were incorrect," he said.
"Furthermore, the affidavit of Mr Hutson suggests improper conduct by the receivers in that the affidavit shows they asked an employee of Storm to access personal information of the shareholder."
Cassimatis also took issue with ASIC's request for a court injunction requesting the payment be returned to Storm Financial Limited.
"As I keep saying, if the $2 million is clawed back it will go straight to the bank and not to former Storm clients, and I can't see how that helps anyone," he said.
Earlier this month, ASIC announced the amount of $2 million was transferred from a bank account of Storm Financial Limited on 15 December 2008, within one month of the appointment of voluntary administrators to the company.
