KEY POINTS:
Macquarie Bank made a failed raid on the Auckland International Airport share register this week.
The Millionaires' Factory, as the bank is known, not only bought shares on market, it also approached local and international institutions about buying their shares.
It got a handful of scrip, but it's
understood Macquarie's complex offer was rebuffed by many institutions.
Word is the bank was buying on its own account and is trying to build a 10 per cent stake in the airport.
The increased activity pushed Auckland Airport shares up 17c this week to a record high of $2.65.
Which bank entity - an infrastructure fund, its airport fund or the bank itself - the buying was on behalf of is unclear. But if Macquarie is trying to get a foothold in Auckland Airport it would have to be a long-term game, a very long-term game.
You'd be hard pushed to say the airport was in play.
Neither council on the register - Auckland City with nearly 13 per cent and Manukau a little under 10 per cent - is likely to sell in a hurry, particularly not to an Australian bank.
Nor are local institutions likely to be quick to sell in a shrinking sharemarket.
The question fund managers in New Zealand face is where else they would put their money. Auckland Airport has been a steady performer since listing nearly a decade ago and there's a shortage of large infrastructure stocks on the local market. They have little incentive to sell.
But Macquarie can afford to play a long game.
It could pick up more shares, take a board seat and wait.
It could show itself to be a stable influence on the board and get itself into a strong position to buy either of the councils' stakes should they eventually decide to sell.
It wouldn't be quick, but they've got all the time in the world.
If Macquarie is having a tilt at Auckland Airport, it'll be back.
More questions for Bollard
Poor Alan Bollard.
The Reserve Bank Governor is once again going to be asked to appear before Members of Parliament to explain why monetary policy isn't working and what can be done to fix it.
Over the weekend, the 13 members of Parliament's finance and expenditure select committee will be wondering what can be done about the economy.
More accurately, they're drawing up the terms of reference for their inquiry into the economy. In other words, they're wondering about what they can wonder about what can be done about the economy.
But select committee chairman Shane Jones is able to say the committee will look at how productivity can be improved and re-examine the work done by Treasury and the Reserve Bank on how to make monetary policy more effective - the snappily-titled supplementary instruments project.
That project didn't come up with any workable solutions, but this won't stop the select committee from hauling Bollard in to go over the same old ground once again.
"We're certainly going to invite Dr Bollard back again," Jones told the Business Herald. "He'll be one of the experts that comes before the committee. Obviously we're going to look at the instruments and the operation of monetary policy,"
Jones acknowledges his committee probably won't find much of a solution, but will give it its best shot when it draws up the terms of reference. "The test is not to make it so narrow and technical that it's irrelevant but not to make it so broad that we get lost in a network of rabbit warrens."
Finance Minister Michael Cullen's fighting words on monetary policy this week are likely to add some spice to the proceedings.
"The exporting sector has been called on to take too much of the strain of macroeconomic management by way of monetary policy," he said.
"Nor can we be satisfied with a monetary policy framework and operation which so heavily penalises the export sector."
Cullen said this year that he was pleased with the job Bollard had been doing and would reappoint him when his term as Governor expires in September.
But his comments this week appear to come close to criticism of Bollard himself.
Indeed, Bollard is starting to look like a whipping boy for some problems in the economy that aren't of his own making - such as the country's low productivity, appalling savings rate and fixation on housing as an investment. It's a pity economies can't be powered by Government inquiries. Then all our problems would be solved - we'd be a very wealthy nation and back in the top half of the OECD in no time at all.
Christopher Niesche is editor of the Business Herald.
