Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Mike Moore: Return to Muldoonism?

Poor Mike Moore still has most of his lefty ideals intact but at Political Animal we agree that his sentiments below regarding the Prime Minister Helen Clark and her girlfriends in the Labour cabinet slagging off John Key without any substance or truth are spot on.

I made the comment about Clark and comparing her tenure at the helm of New Zealand with Muldoons reign of terror in the 70s-80s.

Seems the similarities of both Governments are apparent to more than just moi.

Clark usually has responses to such outbursts in the media but has refused to comment on this matter.

In combination with her rorting in the polls 2 days ago the Prime Ministers silence has been deafening.





Mike Moore Wednesday 29 2007


In the 1980s, a cruelly funny cartoon appeared of David Lange. It had four panels - the first displayed a smiling picture of David, then slowly, over the next two panels, David's face morphed into a picture of Roger Douglas.

I'm expecting a cartoon of Helen Clark to appear, morphing into an angry Robert Muldoon. He used SIS files on opponents, perfected the nasty technique of personally destroying opponents, intimidating the media (not that you have to muzzle sheep), and used the levers of Government to create stunts, diversions, and buy votes in marginal seats.

Now there's menacing changes to the electoral law to outlaw legitimate funding that could be considered political in an election year. I will publish a book next year, will that be covered? Absent is a necessary rule to disclose who's donating to political parties. Why?

The attacks on possible, probable enemies of the state has even gone overseas to attacks on Australian Foreign Minister Downer for speaking at a National Party conference, when Labour regularly has overseas politicians speak to the troops. The media breathlessly talked of a "secret" meeting.

Downer said he thought it more appropriate to have a private family Tory meeting. He said he advised the New Zealand Government, no big deal, but this was denied. Who do you believe?

Now Labour, as predicted, has tried to put a blowtorch down National leader John Key's 'Y' fronts. Calling him a "rich guy" coming from people, many of whom went to exclusive schools, enjoyed a comfortable upbringing, and didn't even have to work during university holidays is a bit much.

Even the normally sensible Phil Goff has joined the chorus, hoping to ingratiate himself with left-wing MPs for later. Aspirational politics, an inclusive economy and social mobility was once Labour's strongest economic and social policy credential.

This politics of personal destruction is fearful. Why is Labour so good at it? Because we practise on each other.

Helen Clark is superb at it, she's destroyed more National leaders than any other Labour leader. Come to think about it, she's dispatched more Labour leaders than anyone else too. Now Labour is planning a major re-shuffle. It's needed.

We have the largest Cabinet in the Western world per head of population. Killing the wounded is the hardest job in politics, particularly if they have been loyal subjects.

They are bled slowly, swirling rumours appear, planted from Beehive sources, then, when the victim is anaemic, too exhausted to fight back, someone is dispatched to put the pillow over their head. If Helen can replace half of her Cabinet and keep the show together, it will mark her out as one of the greatest political managers ever.

It's very hard. Muldoon's circle of close mates got smaller and weaker as he got older too. Exactly what does the "consort" Judith Tizard and the legion of Ministers outside Cabinet actually do?

Perhaps it's good they don't do much. They manage the remarkable feat of being self-important, expensive, trivial and irrelevant at the same time.

John Key just has to keep his head down, and is happy to campaign as "Labour with tax cuts", sort of like playing a vacuous political air guitar. As for Winston Peters, our Foreign Minister still seems to hate foreigners.

He can't speak about hospitals without talking of Third World diseases and Third World people, the Central Bank policies are about, he claims, promoting speculation and money-lenders (code word), Dubai investment in New Zealand is naturally bad, but at least the anti-Asian and Muslim stuff has been shelved for a while.

Rodney Hide seems to have rejected capitalism for narcissism and is destined to be a talk-back celebrity. The Greens and the Maori Party have locked up their small market niche and go unquestioned by the media.

The major political parties don't scrutinise them or test them in Parliament because they will decide who forms the Government. Labour could still form the next Government, even if we get fewer votes than National. Under MMP, a silver and a bronze trumps a gold medal.

Meanwhile, New Zealand continues to slip down the OECD ladder of successful economies. World growth is robust at 5 per cent, Australia will grow at 4 per cent. New Zealand half that. Labour productivity was close to zero in the last year, down from 2.7 per cent, 1992-2000. New Zealand's tax ratio is 43 per cent of gross domestic product, Australia's 35 per cent. Australia's spending on a ratio of GDP is 34 per cent, New Zealand's 41 per cent (close to France).

These are huge differences, and getting bigger. That's why an Australian will earn 30 per cent more than a Kiwi, and 500 Kiwis leave each week for better opportunities.

The Government's response? Run a media campaign in Australia telling people to come home!

* Mike Moore is a former Labour Prime Minister


c NZ Herald & Darren Rickard 2007

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Burger Fuel Director explains Share Price drop

Image result for burger fuel

Josef Roberts, a Director of Burger Fuel (BFW) has kindly answered a question that many of you out there would like to ask him.

I put this to him in an email today:

Do you have any comments with regards to the dropping share price and your initial valuation of the IPO?


Josef replied

Not really – as you know at present there is nervousness in world markets and general tightening of the economy, but in our case it’s mainly due to a situation of low stock liquidity; so just a few small trades can cause the stock to drop if someone needs cash or wants to accept a lower offer. The actual trades are very low.

I don't share Josef's opinion as to the share price drop. I would agree with him that liquidity would affect the share price somewhat but if the market had an overwhelming positive feeling over Burger Fuel's IPO valuation then the low stock liquidity would have presumably shot the share price well above the NZ$1 IPO price as the reality of the market negativity over Burger Fuel's market cap has seen the share price dip to 65c as of today.




Burger Fuel Worldwide @ Share Investor

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Discuss BFW @ Share Investor Forum - Register free





Share Investor 2007
 




2007 Full Year Profit: Goodman Fielder Pie Gets Bigger

Goodman Fielder Ltd [GFF.NZX] the Australasian food company, has announced a solid profit for Full Year 2007. Net profit on a pro-forma basis, to include a full 12 months performance, was $243.2 million, up 23 per cent on 2006.

Revenue was up 2% to slightly over AU$ 2.4 Billion with strong contributions from Australia but flat input from New Zealand.

During the year Goodman added multiple brands to its stable of everyday home staples that include: Vogel's Bread, Kiwi Bacon, Irvine's Baked Goods and Tararua Dairy products. GFF note that they have integrated the companies that they have bought well and are poised to get good growth from these acquisitions.

Goodman Fielder's Brands set the company apart in this part of the world. They dominate many aspects of the food staples families use everyday, especially breakfast. It is comparable to Kraft, the US food conglomerate, in this respect.

The share price has appreciated markedly over the past few weeks as investors seem to be rushing towards so-called "safe havens" in this time of market turmoil. GFF was dual listed on New Zealand's NZX and Australia's ASX at the end of 2005 at AU$2 a share and has traded consistently on the NZ exchange at a range of NZ$2.10 to just over $3.

A slow but unspectacular growth story with solid revenues wont see much of an increase in share price but there has been recent talk of Australia's Coca Cola Amital being interested in buying the company for its broad range of brands that would compliment some of the strong brands that Coke manages.

The interest of Asian business in Australian food groups is another good reason to hold onto those GFF shares. Apparently those in the food business in Asia see this region as some sort of food holy grail:


What's going on? "A lot of Asian tycoons are seeking to take strategic positions in an area they think will be the next money spinner," says Richard Beaurepaire, head of research at consultancy Bain & Co. in Sydney. "They understand that food will become a scarce resource in Asia over the next few years as the land and water to support the region's 3 billion or so increasingly prosperous, urbanized people are not there." Australia, which likes to style itself as the Supermarket of Asia, produces abundant food that can be shipped fast to its neighbors.(asiaweek.com)

I like Goodman Fielder for the loyalty of customers for the brands that it sells. More often than not this loyalty can last a lifetime and can get passed on through generations making owning a such a company a good lifetime bet.

Goodman Fielder shares were up 3c today at NZ$2.95.


Disclosure: I own GFF shares.


Goodman Fielder @ Share Investor

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c Share Investor 2007

Monday, August 27, 2007

NZX Share Trades with Strings Attached

Image result for burger fuel

While trying to put a market order in today on the NZAX for Burger Fuel (BFW) it appears an individual cannot make his own mind up just what the market price for a particular share is on a given day.

I wasn't fully aware of this, only just in passing but for shares trading between 10c - $1 you have to bid a minimum of .7 multiplied by the closing price of the share on the previous day. Shares above $1 are multiplied by .8 , shares between 5-10c .6 and below 5c .5.

This little market manipulator came into force early July 2007 and really pumps my blood warmer than a ten year old relieving himself in a public pool on a cold Winters day!

I mean where do Mark Weldon and co get off, it is a Market Limit , what that means to this capitalist pig is that the market is supposed to decide what a share or company is worth on a given day, prospective shareholders are the market and it should be up to us to decide what value we place on a company.

I can understand why this little handbrake may have been applied-to stop a market from sliding too quickly on a bad trading day-but surely this kind of market manipulation must be open to all sorts of jiggery-pokery?

I'm quite sure the upper offer market limits are not enforced similarly so why the hell do weak companies need their hands held as their share prices get hammered on any given day?

Quite frankly they don't and Mark Weldon and the NZX board would be wise to take another look at this recent hamstringing of a so-called free share market and let the market decide what New Zealand listed companies are worth.

Incidentally, I wanted to bid $NZ .20c for 5000 BFW shares as the share price as of today has fallen almost 15% to .65c today. I have lowered my value of the company as I see further costs related to increased borrowing for the company and possible franchisees having an affect on medium term growth, expansion and obviously profit.


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Share Investor 2007