It turns out that in the £9 million fundraiser announced by AIM-listed Vatukoula Gold Mines last week, its former owner, Canadian mining and leisure tycoon Wally Berukoff, made an overnight profit of £860,000 by exercising an option to buy back 200 million shares. When Canadian Zinc Corporation agreed to buy his 18% stake in Vatukoula earlier this year, Berukoff inserted the option to buy 200 million back at 1p each.

He took up the option on Tuesday as the shares closed in London at 1.43p. Canadian Zinc, which wanted to merge with Vatukoula but had to settle for a 17.2% stake instead, has now been forced to top up its own holding by buying 156 million new Vatukoula shares at 1.28p.

In a further blow to Canadian Zinc, it has had to drop its option on Berukoff's Tuvatu gold mine, also in Fiji. Zinc had held the option since May this year, since when the mine's value has risen with the soaring gold price. It looked like a great deal for Canadian Zinc, but the sudden draw on its cash has forced the company to drop the purchase, leaving the mine with Berukoff.

City Spy suspects the profits may end up in Cuba, where Berukoff is developing three major leisure resorts in partnership with Fidel Castro's government.

Oleg sails into another storm

PARTS of Lord Mandelson's yachting buddy Oleg Deripaska's business empire are on the ropes again. The Moscow Arbitration Court has declared the billionaire oligarch's bookstore chain, Bookberry, bankrupt and pushed for liquidation. No sooner had the great helmsman digested this bit of unpalatable news, than Russia's largest private bank Alfa announced it had filed a bankruptcy suit against two major units of UC Rusal, the world's biggest aluminium maker, which he also owns.

In a statement, Alfa said it was seeking the bankruptcy of the Siberian-Urals Aluminium Company. Alfa also filed a suit against the giant Krasnoyarsk aluminium smelter - where legend has it Deripaska used to sleep with a gun under his camp bed during the so-called "Aluminium Wars," in Russia's 1990s Wild West.

Spens is on a family mission

CITY SPY learns that the Financial Service Authority has recently appointed Lord Spens as head of market monitoring. No, not that Lord Spens but his son. Named Patrick like his colourful father, who died in 2001, the 41-year-old from Goldman Sachs has personal experience of what happens when City rules are bent. Although scarcely more than a boy when the Guinness bid for Distillers became mired in scandal in 1986, he can only have been too aware of his father's troubles. Spens senior was involved in the operation which led to one of the most high-profile financial trials of the last century.

Forced by the Bank of England to resign as chief executive of the bank, Henry Ansbacher, the late Lord Spens, was finally acquitted of charges against him in 1992 but he spent the rest of his life fighting to restore his ruined reputation.

Insider dealers and their ilk had better watch out as his son will doubtless have an eagle eye for any untoward share-movements...

* A RARE defeat for Tesco, which has been sent scurrying from Holmfirth, the town that is home to aged TV series Last of the Summer Wine. Storekeepers and other locals campaigned against the supermarket's plan to open a store, arguing it would damage the community. Cue headlines like "Tesco beats a retreat after barrage from Nora Batty's neighbours". But Tesco is not known for backing off. Like Jaws, there will be a sequel. "We remain committed to our proposed investment," says a spokesman. Sometimes, you have to hand it to Tesco: an entire town just told the company where to get off and the company's response is that they don't know what's good for them.

* ACCOUNTANTS PricewaterhouseCoopers appear to pay no attention to the old saying about never kicking someone when they're down. The firm was delighted with the result of an employment tribunal case brought by former employee Mihaela Popa. She claimed up to £40 million after alleging she was made to "feel like a prostitute" while working at PwC. So the firm was chuffed when the tribunal awarded the 31-year-old just £750 compensation. The body ruled that PwC was only guilty of providing her with an unfavourable reference. PwC is now believed to be seeking costs from Popa, which could run into six figures.

* SO Aviva has finally agreed to distribute various orphan assets to policyholders - £470 million from a pot of £1.25 billion. Presumably the rest goes to the marketing department to pay for another series of schizophrenic adverts. A while ago, you will recall, Aviva's TV campaign was all about changing your name so that you could become "who you always wanted to be". Aviva, we learnt, wanted to be Ringo Starr or Alice Cooper. Presumably being a reliable insurer was too dull... Lately, Aviva has decided it wants to be a strange old man who drives friends who don't like him to football matches and occasional shouts "green army". Weird and weirder.

* THE times, they sure are a-changed. One-time protester Bob Dylan is releasing an album of cover tracks next month - and has done a deal with, er, Citibank to help sell it. The troubled US bank, bailed out to the tune of $45 billion, is releasing the album for download for its 13 million credit card loyalty members, a week before it hits the stores.

* FUND managers GMO and AllianceBernstein have had a dressing down from an unlikely source: the bibliophiles at the London Library. The St James's Square institution reveals in its annual report that it has ditched the two US firms for Legal & General, stating "over the course of the year the performance of both fund managers gave increasing cause for concern." The library's equity funds lost almost a third in line with the markets between March last year and this year.