This Herald piece reveals, shock horror, rivalry in the mortgage market. With ANZ fingering ASB as the reason for it struggling in the past half year. With reporting like this there will soon be nothing left to know about the mortgage market ;-)
But in other news, Ralph Norris has good reason to be pleased - not just because a small part of his new empire is doing well, but because Air New Zealand staff will miss him. At Air New Zealand he will long be remembered as someone who took the company successfully through a very difficult period.
However, shareholders have not been having such a happy time. For a long time the shares have frankly been overvalued - when they were at at over $2 last year I personally felt that this was a silly price, based on the chance that governments might allow Air New Zealand and Qantas to 'collaborate' to the point of merger. Today, this is where we are at (courtesy of sharechat):
"The stock touched an intraday low of $1.20c, before recovering to trade a cent higher at $1.22.
It has dipped below $1.20 just once before, on September 24, 2001 when the shares hit 88c (in adjusted terms, following a five-for-one share consolidation this time last year) as the airline teetered on the brink of bankruptcy.
At these levels, the Government is $80-$100 million out of pocket on its $1 billion investment in Air NZ, for which it paid an average of $1.30 per share. "
But the latest lows have more to do with oil price than boardrooms or governments. With higher surcharges the market simply reckons people will fly less. That looks like a sensible conclusion - for now.