How Bling Brothers went their separate ways
Court victory came at high price for Candys
Property baron Nick Candy was wreathed in smiles as he squired his wife, former Neighbours star Holly Valance, at princess eugenie’s wedding.
At the side of his elegant blonde spouse, he was in his element in the company of Kate Moss, tracey emin, robbie Williams and James Blunt.
Nick, 45, is the more flamboyant half of the Candy Brothers, a duo synonymous with the rise of London’s oligarchs, sheikhs and other members of the global gazillionaire set.
But behind the enviable facade, life in Candy-land has been turbulent.
Nick and younger brother Christian, 44, are still nursing their bruises from a lurid High Court battle that continues to cast a shadow. the siblings, who are routinely spoken of in the City as if they were joined at the hip, are now going their separate ways in business.
Nick is no longer even concentrating on property but focusing instead on start-ups, tech and music companies.
Just days before his and Holly’s appearance at the royal wedding, it emerged that Nick had taken out an £80m loan from Credit Suisse – thought to be Britain’s biggest-ever mortgage – against his swanky penthouse at one Hyde park in London.
the apartment sits atop one of the blocks that he developed with his brother in the oligarchs’ playground that is Knightsbridge.
this led to feverish speculation about the state of his finances, though sources say he in fact borrowed the £80m several years ago. the latest deal is understood to be the transfer of the mortgage, and ownership of the penthouse, from his personal name to two companies based in Guernsey.
He plans to rent out the £160m apartment, which sprawls over 18,000 square feet on the top two floors of one block. ‘ He feels £150,000 a week is the right level,’ says a source.
Nick and Holly, at 35 a decade his junior, lived in the flat for five years before recently moving to providence House, a £75m megamansion in the grounds of the royal Hospital Chelsea.
there may indeed be less to the £80m mortgage than meets the eye, but like many other aspects of the Candy Brothers’ business affairs, the loan is both startling and intriguing.
THe duo, known as the Brothers Bling for their love of glitz, forged one of the most controversial partnerships ever to hit the British property world. one Hyde park itself came to be seen as an emblem for their remarkable rise.
the nature of the brothers’ relationship has also given rise to a great deal of gossip on the London scene. the pair have always been rather less close in commercial terms than the routine pairing of their names might suggest. In the summer, the fact one of their main companies was re-christened from Candy & Candy to Candy property, and put into Nick’s sole name, was interpreted as a breach – at least in business terms – between the two. In reality, it was a formal acknowledgment that they have run quite distinct operations for several years.
Christian’s main business is a Guernsey-based company called CpC Group (that pays tax in the UK), which looks after the lucrative property development side. Nick’s is Candy property, which concentrates on interior decor.
In court last year it was claimed this division was a fiction aimed at avoiding tax – an accusation the brothers vehemently deny.
Nick is spending a lot of time on his investment business, Candy Ventures, which takes stakes in tech companies such as augmented reality business Blippar and music firm Audioboom.
‘they each have their own interests and are not working on anything together at the moment,’ said one source. ‘there has been no rift or sudden decision – their directions have evolved as they have grown older and found their own individual interests.’
At last year’s High Court case, brought by Mark Holyoake, a room-mate of Nick’s at reading University, the relationship between the brothers was at times portrayed as extremely strained.
Holyoake is a highly controversial character with a chequered business record, including the collapse of a company with £250m debts and a Serious Fraud office probe, albeit the investigation was eventually dropped.
the wrangle was about a £12m loan Holyoake had taken through the Candys that had rapidly gone bad. Holyoake alleged all manner of misconduct on their part, from heavy- duty intimidation to tax dodging, and was claiming £132m in damages, which he alleged to be his losses at their hands.
the Candys won the case and have so far received around £5.7m from Holyoake, but it was not an unalloyed triumph. their names were dragged through the mud by their accuser, and the judge, Mr Justice Nugee, branded all three men as liars.
As Nick himself admitted: ‘ For the rest of our lives there is going to be a slight smell.’
In truth, few were interested in the rights or wrongs.
What was truly riveting was the insight it gave into the lifestyle of the Candys. this was skilfully portrayed by Holyoake’s lawyers as a combination of lavish luxury and showbiz connections, laced with menace and familial dysfunction.
the picture painted of the brothers by Holyoake’s wife, emma, was particularly dark.
SHe claimed that, despite being the younger by a year, Christian was the dominant one who bullied Nick and despised his wife, Holly. emma said Holly told her, at a 2012 party in Ibiza, Nick had been distraught about Christian’s behaviour and had ‘lain down in a foetal position on the floor of a hotel room and wept inconsolably’.
often described as billionaires, it is impossible to say how rich the Candys really are because their affairs are conducted through a web of businesses.
A chart supplied to the court showed they have 140 companies, many of them in tax havens.
the case has left its mark. the brothers went ahead rather than reaching a discreet settlement because they did not want to give in to what they saw as an attempted shakedown by a discredited businessman.
But a year on, they are left to ponder whether that victory in court was really worth it.