Share Investor: New Zealand Herald

Showing posts with label New Zealand Herald. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

NZ Herald backs Sky City Convention Centre to the hilt

At the risk of boring my readers rigid with yet another post about the Sky City Convention Centre, let me be as brief as I can.

The New Zealand Herald has been highly critical of Sky City Entertainment Group Ltd [SKC.NZX] in the past in its pages but has come out earlier this week and fully backed the company in its proposal to fund a National Convention Centre for the benefit of all New Zealanders:

The strongest argument for Sky City building and fully funding its construction and ongoing costs is encompassed in the following key paragraphs:

"But if SkyCity can make a convention centre pay without need of a public subsidy, its case is better. It means the public will not be taking on the risk that the centre will not attract sufficient conferences on the scale required - a risk all the greater when it is operated by a public body with public finance to fall back on.

SkyCity will carry the risk, giving it every incentive to compete keenly with other international conference destinations. Auckland's interest will be carried by a company that already runs a smaller convention centre with its casino. It is, as a Labour Party spokesman complains, a "multinational". It knows the business and must have confidence that Auckland can compete.

It is not clear whether the company's request for additional casino capacity is vital to its convention plans. It may be that the only thing the company needs from the Government is an assurance that it will not fund a competing facility. No business can compete with a bottomless public purse.

SkyCity has proven its competence and its commitment to Auckland. This investment offers more jobs, more visitors, more business for the city at no public outlay. In the end, that must recommend it." NZ Herald, 14 June 2011

The issues over negotiating details around gaming law changes are a moot point and sides taken by various members of the public must not cloud the ultimate aim of the convention centre and that is to provide a stimulas to the economy at a time when the country is suffering the worst recession since the Great Depression at no risk to the local or state governments.

That clearly must be applauded whatever side you come down on in terms of politics and attitudes to gaming.

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c Share Investor 2011

Monday, January 24, 2011

Allan Hubbard Saga: Hubbard Defiant in 2011

Many hours of time have been whiled away by mainstream journalists, bloggers and supporters of disgraced businessman Allan Hubbard during 2010 over his dodgy business practices and collapsed empire. As 2010 drew to a close few final conclusions could be drawn from investigations made into South Canterbury Finance, Aorangi Securities and a whole raft of businesses owned by Hubbard and now in receivership, gone bust or in Statutory Management.

What we do know is that Hubbard has been, for the last few years anyway, bending the rules big time when it came to the day to day running of his business interests. Fraud, forgery, endemic related party lending to make the books look good, omissions and padding of paperwork, fake investments and highly risky lending were par for the course.

Interested parties to the Allan Hubbard Saga currently await the outcomes of several investigations into the stubbornly defiant octogenarian. The Serious Fraud Office is waiting for a response from Hubbard's Lawyer Mike Heron on his behalf to a range of possible charges which were outlined prior to Christmas and a 6th Grant Thorton Report on Aorangi Securities Limited, Hubbard Management Funds, Hubbard Churcher Trust Management Limited, Forresters Nominee Company Limited, Mr AJ and Mrs MJ Hubbard and Associated Charitable Trusts is due at the end of February 2011.

The long wait on final decisions on what to charge Hubbard for are primarily due to the complicated nature of Mr Hubbards business empire and the lack of precise, or any, paperwork.

Obfuscation on the part of Hubbard and his lawyer during the investigation has also led to a delay in charging.

As published in the New Zealand Herald today and written by Fran O Sullivan, Hubbard has sent a 2 page memo to Simon Power pleading his case:

The Business Herald understands the SFO has indicated that it had narrowed its investigation to four particular issues - one relates to the failure to issue a prospectus for Aorangi Securities, and, another focuses on statements Hubbard Funds Management made which are alleged to have misled investors.

"I think the charges they are proposing are ridiculous and I cannot see any court of law upholding them," said Hubbard. "I've stolen no money - they're dreaming up charges."

Hubbard maintains Aorangi had never traded recklessly, had always paid its interest seven days before due, was not insolvent and had always paid obligations with default during its 36-year history.

"The action taken signalled the death knell for South Canterbury Finance with incoming deposits immediately falling from $2 million weekly to $200,000 per week..."

I agree with Hubbard that the courts may have trouble upholding any possible charges, you just need to recall the history thus far of failed finance company directors who have never been charged or skipped serious charges in the courts over the last year to concur.

Having said that, we know that Mr Hubbard has been less than truthful in his public statements in his own defence. It is crystal clear that there was a rotten core at the middle of his empire and that he was at least partially responsible for the rot. It is quite likely there are others involved but Mr Hubbard was the head banana and he needs to take responsibility for his actions in the coming year.

Allan Hubbard Saga

Full SFO Statement on SCF Fraud Investigation

Hubbard Letter to Simon Power

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Compulsory Super fails on all fronts

The contention in the NZ Herald Editorial today that compulsory superannuation is the answer to our economic and savings "problems" is wide of the mark on most points:

"So compelling is the case for compulsory superannuation that it is a mystery why the Government is setting up yet another working group...it is not a question of whether there should be compulsory superannuation but when and how it should be introduced".

What happened to personal choice and the attractiveness of a savings package alone that would have individuals flocking to save for their future?

There is one thing that I agree with the editorial writer on. That is the Government should do something.

On what should be done by them though the editorial writer and I strongly disagree.

The Herald wants the government to force individuals into saving. Force them into low quality saving based on compulsion rather than the quality of the investment.

I would contend that the government only need provide incentive and therefore choice for individuals to save for themselves by removing the obvious tax barriers that all investments, bar investment property, are weighed down by.

Make investing tax free, or lower taxed for you socialists out there (mind you you would want me to pay for your retirement) and people would be saving and saving more. The only decision they would have to make is who to go with.

This, by and large, will provide choice, quality, personal responsibility and good returns over the long-term.

It is proven that we will invest when there is a good incentive and we freely invest in rental housing when there is a clear advantage to that investment and this sector has boomed.

A government mandated compulsory savings scheme is doomed to failure - the recent failure of Kiwisaver is a case in point. Government schemes have always been failures and always will be - seen anything positively successful any Government has done..well duhhahhh!. They distort the economy and have provided poor returns.

The Herald sees compulsion as the answer to providing local capital to grow business and the economy. Lowering or taking the tax off buying and holding shares would have much better results than compulsion and the added benefit is that you get to choose what you invest in!

Imagine that actually choosing what to invest in based on its financial merits rather than compulsorily investing in any old investment garbage.

The Herald is right, we need to save and invest in our future.

Personal responsibility and choice though are better reasons to save than being told you should put your money into an undefined, uncertain, government mandated super scheme. Schemes that are open to political manipulation and the self interest of bureaucrats and State sanctioned financial advisors.

We cannot trust compulsion, only personal choice when it comes to investing in our future.

Compulsion without real incentive always fails.

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c Share Investor 2010

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Media not blameless in climate of "financial fear"

At the best of times the mainstream media in New Zealand struggles with the full unvarnished truth.

At the worst of times this struggle comes at a cost, not to the media outlet but to the individuals at the other end of the story.

Business media coverage in New Zealand can be the worst branch of the mainstream bunch.

They rarely know what the heck they are talking about, usually from an ignorance of business and/ or their knowledge comes from a book rather than practical experience.

Accuracy and ethics are often practiced with a very light hand when it comes to the coordination of the brain to the pen and often sacrificed for more viewer eyeballs or paper sales.

Why the hard word on mainstream journos Darren?

Well, let me tell you and please read carefully because what I am saying is true.

I have a healthy disrespect for the media as a whole but the coverage of the financial turmoil the world has been experiencing over the last 2 years or so has left me with my disrespect hanging in tatters around my ankles.

Mainstream media emphasize the negative ad nauseam that is because the more they do the more product they sell.

Sure things are bad but half the worlds problem at the moment is fear, a fear that is being somewhat artificially stimulated by green journos with a company axe to grind.

This clearly doesn't help our current situation and now more than ever there is a requirement to be deadly accurate.

The reason for writing this in the first place was motivated by an incident that happened to one of my clients a week or so ago and it involved a young woman journo from the New Zealand Herald/Newstalk ZB using "off the record" information from her subject (after cold calling) specifically asked by the subject not to use that information but did so anyway.

Not only was the first request by the subject not to use the information ignored but the report was highly inaccurate.

The aforementioned "news" piece subsequently sparked a week long agony as the subject of it had to take hundreds of calls from suppliers asking if their company was going out of business, including, I must say with much shame, myself.

Jobs and a reasonable sized business were at stake and if a story were to be done first, the subject's permission is required and the story needs to at least reflect the truth of the matter.

It aint always about selling advertising boys and girls.

Sometimes it is simply about people's lives.

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Monday, November 12, 2007

New Zealand Herald gets nasty over Electoral Finance Bill

I have never seen the likes of this before in my life. The New Zealand Herald has used its entire front page today to rail against Helen Clark and the Sisterhood over their attempt to buy next years election by using their Electoral Finance Bill to make previous illegal spending of taxpayer money, to promote themselves, legal and to stop debate during an election year.

The Herald, usually left leaning, has come out strongly against the bill and should be congratulated for their strong stand.

This bill, if passed through in November, will put New Zealand in the position that many dictator states now find themselves in. A Government that will stop at almost nothing to get re-elected and a population that wont be able to have their democratic right to voice opposition and if they do so they could be imprisoned.

New Zealanders as a whole don't seem to be angry about this bill and what it means. They should be. Is it that we just don't care that our democracy will be no longer or are we just too stupid to see what is happening?

Lenin, Marx, Mao and Hitler would have be proud of this bill.

C Darren Rickard 2007

The Herald Editorial

Editorial: Democracy Under Attack

5:00AM Monday November 12, 2007

When is the Government going to get this message: democracy is not a device to keep the Labour Party in power.

Practically every other participant in New Zealand politics - not only parties but other interested organisations and especially guardians of political rights - has voiced concern at the implications of the Electoral Finance Bill introduced to Parliament more than three months ago.

The Human Rights Commission has described the restrictions on election activity as a "dramatic assault" on fundamental rights which "undermines the legitimacy of political processes".

The Law Society says the bill would "make participation in our parliamentary democracy an arduous and perhaps even legally dangerous undertaking for ordinary New Zealanders".

They say this because it would be illegal in election year for any organisation other than a registered political party to spend more than $60,000 (perhaps a couple of full-page advertisements) to publicise a cause that might be deemed political.

In the face of near-universal condemnation, the bill should have been withdrawn. Instead it will be tweaked to dilute some of its worst features. But the attempt to restrict non-party participation in election discussion will remain.

Labour seems determined to use the time it has left to skew electoral laws in its favour.

Not only does it mean to make election debate the preserve of political parties, it has introduced this month a second electoral outrage - a bill to extend the law legalising the use of public money for political purposes that were ruled improper by the Auditor General after the last election.

The Clark Government's refusal to bow to public opinion on this subject beggars belief. It was staggering enough last year that Helen Clark and her lieutenants could not understand why nobody else regarded their electoral pledge card as innocent information.

Now, having grudgingly repaid the public purse, they are hell-bent on giving themselves the right to raid it again.

If these bills become law, politics will be largely confined to registered parties, and they will have to be able to use parliamentary funds for election campaigns.

Both measures are designed to favour the party that has devised them. Labour fears independent campaigns by the likes of the Exclusive Brethren much more than National fears the efforts of the PPTA or the Council of Trade Unions. And Labour believes it needs public money to balance covert contributions to the National Party.

Parties have different advantages. If National has more well-heeled donors, Labour probably has the more committed and articulate foot soldiers.

National's supposed advantages were of less urgent concern to Labour when it was polling well. Now in desperation it wants to screw the scrum. It has succumbed to the old conceit of the Left that the interests of the people are identical with its own.

The interests of any healthy democracy lie in unrestricted debate, not laws that favour incumbents with public finance and suppression of free speech.

If these bills pass, they will be Labour's epitaph.

C NZ Herald 2007

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Wednesday, June 15, 2011

NZ Herald backs Sky City Convention Centre to the hilt

Monday, January 24, 2011

Allan Hubbard Saga: Hubbard Defiant in 2011

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Compulsory Super fails on all fronts

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Media not blameless in climate of "financial fear"

Monday, November 12, 2007

New Zealand Herald gets nasty over Electoral Finance Bill

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