A full list of applications for Commerce Commission clearance shows that in the past two years there have been 17 decisions (including two for Sky/Vodafone), with 12 having been cleared and just five declined. But Ward noted that the more recent trend seemed to be negative.
In particular three big mergers involving listed companies, all of which faced challenging futures, have been declined this year.
"A lot of investors are going: why is that the case? Because it does outwardly appear to be going against what you've done in the past."
Competition lawyer John Land said it was possible there had been a "slight toughening" on the merger cases.
"There has been a couple which could perhaps have gone a different way in the past," he said. "Although that doesn't mean they [the commission] were wrong."
Land noted that he hadn't yet looked closely at the Vero decision and that he had agreed with the commission's call on the NZME/Fairfax merger.
He said he was confident the commission was applying the Commerce Act in good faith but agreed that in the past 12 months the ones that had been turned down had been the high-profile applications.
That had a followed quite a long run of approvals, which might have added to the perception of a change in attitude, he said.
But Ward felt the perception of a tougher line was now starting to affect the risk premiums of several New Zealand stocks.
"An offshore investor [faces] a higher hurdle to invest here now, that's what this will tell you. So it has a lot of knock-on effects."
- NZME is publisher of the New Zealand Herald and is appealing in the High Court the Commerce Commission's decision to decline a merger with Fairfax NZ.
