TIMBERCORP'S market capitalisation has shrunk from $316 million six months ago to just $19 million at the start of this week.
In the end, the global financial crisis has done more to curb the growth of managed investment schemes than any attempts by past or present governments to rein in the sector.
The tragedy is rural communities and taxpayers are now going to bear the brunt of the MIS sector's collapse.
Land values will drop and jobs will be lost. Taxpayers and rural Australia also face losing the millions of dollars they poured into MIS.
MIS investors were charged inflated establishment and management fees, which were subsidised to the tune of 40-45 cents in the dollar by Australian tax payers.
Imagine what Australian agriculture could have done with those millions, which were diverted into unwanted blue gum plantations and olive groves.
Australia has instead been left with a legacy of plantation timber that has locked up thousands of hectares of productive land for the past decade and potentially for years to come.
It will be fascinating to see whether Timbercorp survives the financial crisis. But even if it doesn't, some of its key assets, the jewels in its tarnished crown, seem to be quarantined from receivers.
A massive 63,000 megalitres of high-reliability water, mainly in the Murray and Boort irrigation systems, is held by "independent" Timbercorp companies. At least half the almond orchards used by Timbercorp Limited are owned by these independent trusts and infrastructure funds.
If Timbercorp goes into receivership don't be surprised to see many of these assets continuing to operate as if nothing had happened.
The big question for investor-growers is what happens to their harvesting rights?
It seems there's no clear answer.
But whatever happens you can be sure any attempts by receivers to flog off Timbercorp's assets will be held up in the courts for months if not years.
The only real winners will be the receivers and lawyers, who will make sure they're first in line when it comes to a carve-up.
As for the politicians who promoted managed investment schemes, they should hang their heads in shame.
