In the FMA’s latest report, it said finance companies made up only 15% of its inquiries and investigations over the past year and it had just two finance company investigations left to complete.

But Kapiti-based Chris Lee said the FMA had told him that it was looking at Strategic Finance, South Canterbury Finance, fund manager Epic, and St Laurence. And if it wants to take action, it only has limited time left.

“It would lose the FMA credit if it did nothing about Strategic and South Canterbury Finance when they said they would.”

He said Hanover should also still be on the FMA’s to-do list. “It would just be atrocious if they got away with what they did… we’re talking about $3 billion to $4 billion of public money.”

He said directors and trustees had paid tens of thousands of dollars in insurance that was meant to cover billions of dollars of losses. “There hasn’t been a claim. Why? The FMA report probably doesn’t mean they’re giving up, but maybe there’s more that they’re not telling us.”

People seeking to escape accountability for their part in the finance company collapses know by August next year there will be no time left to file action against directors, trustees, auditors, values or the Securities Commission because of the statute of limitation, Lee said.

“Any prospectus, or investment statement, that may have misled investors in 2008 will be beyond inspection by August 2014, unless the courts accept that new evidence should allow cases to be heard beyond the expiry date. Surely the Financial Markets Authority and the Official Assignee will know of this need for urgency.”

He said there was no reason that other companies could not reach settlements with investors similar to that by Forsyth Barr over Credit Sails.

Lee said investors needed to see action over the finance companies’ collapse, aside from the fraud cases brought by the SFO.

“The moratorium solution cleverly used by the likes of Hanover, St Laurence and Strategic, used up around two years of the six years available to file cases against directors, trustees, auditors, valuers and others. Receivers, admittedly busy, under-resourced and maybe with faulty gearboxes, locked in first gear, have used up another three years. I am unaware of their excuses for this extraordinary lack of urgency.”