Exchange raps airport in matter of the missing 'S'

Auckland International Airport and its lawyers have been censured by the stock exchange, for sending out a notice of meeting with a missing letter "S" and no capital letters.

The New Zealand Stock Exchange's regulatory body, the NZXR, told the company's lawyers, Russell McVeagh, that it could not send out the notice referring to "NZX listing rules" but had to say "NZSX Listing Rules".

It had to use capitals when referring to the "Listing Rules".

The company sent out its notice of meeting without making these changes, saying it had "inadvertently gone to print" before getting NZXR approval.

Russell McVeagh told its client that although this breached listing rules, the issues were minor, so it was fine to circulate the notice.

After deciding that Auckland Airport broke two listing rules, NZXR said the matter would not be referred to its disciplinary body because there had been no adverse consequences and the outstanding issues had been of a "trivial nature".

But it toldRussell McVeagh: "NZXR ... does not condone any lawyer advising their client to ignore a breach of the listing rules without consulting NZXR."

* NZXR told Pure New Zealand yesterday that if it did not file its annual report for the year ended June 30, 2004, by next Thursday it would "consider exercising its powers" under listing rules.

These powers include delisting the self-styled merchant banker from the stock exchange entirely.

Company director Stephen McNamara has blamed tardy action by auditors and accountants for the delay in filing the report. Pure NZ shares were suspended from the exchange on September 7 last year.