NZ stocks: Price set today for Freightways offer

By PAUL PANCKHURST

The business week kicks off with the pricing of the Freightways share offer - and one of the most fascinating annual meetings of the year.

The indicative price range per share for the float of the courier firm was set at $1.55 to $1.90.

But Freightways and owner ABN Amro Capital also reserved the right to go outside of the range.

A "book build" from Wednesday to Friday last week saw institutional investors and broking firms say how much they would pay for shares.

Crunching those numbers gives the final price, which will be announced today.

If it is within the bands of the indicative pricing, the issue will raise between $138 million and $165 million.

The annual meeting today in Auckland of Rubicon brings the forestry and biotech investor back to centre stage.

The background includes:

* Court clashes between Guinness Peat Group and US hedge fund Perry Corporation.

* Efforts by Fletcher Challenge Forests to sell its forestry estate. Rubicon owns 19.9 per cent of the forestry company.

* Shareholders Association chairman Bruce Sheppard's call for Rubicon to be liquidated.

* A notice of meeting that featured an epic-length disclosure of remuneration schemes.

* Perry Corporation's trip to the Court of Appeal to win the right to vote all of its shares for the re-election of directors Bill Hasler and John Villiger.