Public Hospitality Group borrowed A$1.8B against venues that cost A$380M

Jon Adgemis, a former KPMG high-flyer, bought his first pub in Balmain in 2015 and three more in Sydney's inner west over the next two years. From 2020, through the COVID-19 lockdowns, he added another 14 establishments, mostly in Sydney with a few in Melbourne, under Public Hospitality Group. ABC business correspondent Ian Verrender reports that many needed extensive renovations, few were completed and some stood idle.

The portfolio cost less than A$300 million to assemble, yet Adgemis accumulated A$1.8 billion in debt, much of it from private credit firms. Verrender says liquidators are expected to examine how he kept raising cash on limited earnings, including whether valuations, many of them increased shortly after purchase, were reasonable. By the time the group collapsed, many properties carried multiple mortgages. Some credit funds charged upwards of 20 per cent interest on loans to developers.

Adgemis declared himself bankrupt in October 2025 to avoid being compelled into bankruptcy by creditors. Liquidators were to begin Federal Court examinations of former associates in August 2026. The ABC piece also notes that former backers Bruce Gordon and Jan Cameron had cut ties with him after money disputes six years earlier.

A$1.8B in debt over a portfolio that cost A$380M to assemble; Adgemis declared bankruptcy in October 2025; Public Hospitality Group in liquidation

The group kept borrowing against venues that generated limited earnings and, in many cases, were still unrenovated.

Valuations on many properties were reportedly raised shortly after purchase, which liquidators are expected to scrutinise.

Investors in the credit funds generally had little idea where their money was deployed, having been promised double-digit returns with claimed mortgage backing.

Private credit is lightly regulated; ASIC estimates close to A$250 billion in loans are outstanding.

When a portfolio's debt is six times what it cost to assemble, valuations are doing the borrowing. High-yield lenders and their investors should ask what the assets actually earn.

Liquidators began examining Adgemis and his associates in the Federal Court from August 2026 and requested records of their dealings. The ABC says the case could show how deeply private credit firms are embedded in the economy. ASIC had warned that the sector faced 'its first real test', and a ratings firm had downgraded a Centuria private credit fund over lending to another developer, Bathla. These findings were still to come when the article was published.