Liam Dann: Good news, bad news... ah well, let's brace for next year

The extraterrestrials we were promised didn't materialise. Photo / Supplied

It must be the end of the year because news releases are exploding all over the place like a Christmas cracker stuffed by regulatory bodies and corporations.

So in the spirit of the pre-Christmas news dump here's a final pile of columns in a tasty snack-sized format.

Taking on the Aussies

First let's celebrate the mighty Fletcher Building and its $1 billion play for Australia's Crane Group.

There's a long way to go before they can claim victory on this one - Australian investors always put up a fight. Don't be surprised to hear Crane interests touting a rival bid in the new year.

Even if Fletcher does win the battle it will still have a big job in making the merger pay for existing shareholders.

There is some understandable concern in the market after the less than stellar results that the last takeover, of Formica, delivered.

But it's Christmas so let's keep the glass half full. This is just such a good story for the New Zealand market because it is new and big and is ultimately about creating value.

From a parochial point of view it is a transtasman battle with the Kiwis taking the lead, even if the two guys leading those Kiwis - CEO Jonathan Ling and chairman Ralph Waters - are Aussies. That's all right, they'll know what to expect.

State power Any civil libertarians kicking up a fuss about the freeze on Mark Hotchin's assets? Probably not, he isn't exactly Mr Popularity after the Hanover failure.

But the powers used by the state to remove his property rights were quite staggering.

He is facing no criminal charges and faces no civil actions. He is not insolvent or deemed to be in need of statutory management.

So basically a Government agency and a High Court judge met in chambers outside the public eye and decided he'd done something which justified the forfeiture of his property rights.

The detail was still (at the time of writing) not available to the public.

This is the first time the Securities Commission has used these powers and the point here is not to comment on the merits or otherwise of targeting this particular individual. But if we are going to give our regulators this kind of power, we need to keep the process open to public scrutiny or there is a risk of us all getting a little too comfortable with an increasingly Orwellian state.

Out with the old ...

So 2010 - it was supposed to be the year we made contact. But instead of advanced extraterrestrial beings all we got was Nasa telling us they'd found alien life in California. Big surprise.

It isn't like we had high expectations after 2009, but the earthquake, Pike River, kiwifruit disease and the ugly mess of the finance company failures has not made for a cheery news list.

What about the bright spots? Well the Government has made some progress towards addressing regulatory issues in the finance sector and regulators now seem to be in overdrive chasing those they see as responsible for the investor losses.

Restoring investor confidence is vital if New Zealand is ever going get its capital markets humming. We saw the start of that process this year.

There have been a few good yarns. Infratil's $700 million buyout of Shell NZ was the deal of the year.

The deal was done as a 50/50 partnership with the NZ Superannuation Fund and was a good model for future public/private investments.

Crystal ball

Tempting as it is to write a crystal-ball-gazing column on the outlook for 2011 it wouldn't be any fun. Times are tough and there is no immediate light at the end of the tunnel.

We have an election and the Rugby World Cup next year. If anything, there is a risk that these events will provide a distraction from some pressing economic issues.

New Zealand - and in particular our Government - can't afford to glide on through 2011 with the promise that we'll all roll our sleeves up and get on with it in 2012.

Global events are moving too quickly. Commodity prices are rising again. Yes, that's good for the export economy but any upside is limited by the inflationary threat of higher food and petrol prices.

Fonterra's farmers are repaying debt, and that commodity cash is going to take some time to flow through to the cities. Meanwhile consumers are about to be hit by a double whammy of high prices and inflation in a low-growth economy.

That's going to really put the squeeze on many. The Government will have increasingly less scope to provide assistance as the deficit comes under closer scrutiny from global markets.

On the up side we are having a big party for rugby fans, and there will hopefully be a mini tourism boom. And who knows, we might finally win the Cup again (quick, touch wood).

Charge up

So next year is not going to be easy. We'll need plenty of mental strength to stay on top in 2011. Which is all the more reason to take a break and enjoy the company of family and friends and forget about the woes of the world for a while. Charge your batteries and park your worries.

Last words to Mark Twain - "I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened."