News round-up

Marlin board commissions report; Barramundi warrants up for expiry; Wellington Drive to raise $8.5m; Diversified PIE fund reports positive returns; SRI strategies for retirement falling short; Changes to Securities Regulations in brief

Monday, September 21st 2009, 5:00AM

Marlin board commissions report
The board of Marlin Global has commissioned KPMG to prepare an independent report on the structure of Marlin.

It will address, along with other things, the benefits and costs to Marlin's shareholders of the current listed company structure and the benefits and costs of an open-ended unlisted managed fund.

The report will be completed in time for discussion at the annual shareholders' meeting next week on October 28.

Barramundi warrants up for expiry
Barramundi shareholders are out of the money and the warrants given at IPO date have turned out to be worthless.

As the final warrant exercise date of October 26 approaches, shareholders have the following options:

Elect to exercise some or all of their warrants
Elect not to exercise any warrants, in which any rights in regard to them will expire
Sell or transfer their warrants on the NZSX until Wednesday 21 October.

Any warrants not exercised by October 26 will expire.

At the original IPO, the company gave shareholders one warrant for every two shares, valued at $1.

Wellington Drive to raise $8.5m
Wellington Drive Technologies plans to raise $8.5 million via a placement of shares to its biggest investor, Australian ethical fund manager Hunter Hall Investment Management.

The company agreed to place 85 million new ordinary shares at 10 cents a piece to Hunter Hall. The transaction is subject to shareholder approval because it will push Hunter Hall's stake to above 19.9%.

Wellington Drive plans to hold a shareholder meeting in late October to vote on the plan.

Diversified PIE fund reports positive returns
The Diversified Wealth Management Balanced PIE Fund has recorded positive returns in the last 12 months, up 3.62%.

The industry average for balanced PIE funds for the same period was -4.11.

Funds under management as at August 30 is 4.4 million.

SRI strategies for retirement falling short
The pick-up of socially responsible investing (SRI) in New Zealand relating to retirement nest eggs has been "too little too late", according to the chief of the Council for Socially Responsible Investment and strategies around retirement saving need to be re-thought to match a changing environment.

Dr Robert Howell told delegates at a seminar on investment strategies in Christchurch that "While the introduction of KiwiSaver has been a major success, the SRI option via KiwiSaver has been a spectacular flop. Our estimate is that 0.2% of KiwiSaver funds have a SRI factor. This means there is a greater risk to retirement nest eggs".

He said increases to SRI are currently too small to provide a solution to ecological degradation and that unless the trend is significantly and quickly changed, the risk to New Zealanders' investments will significantly increase.

Changes to Securities Regulations in brief
The Securities Regulations come into effect on October 1 this year and in addition to introducing regulation for simplified disclosure prospectuses, there are a number of other important changes that will affect all issuers.

They include:

Regulation 17 Certificates are no more. They will become Regulation 30 Certificates.
Restrictions on referring in advertisements to the amount of assets of issuers are extended to life insurance companies, participatory securities, superannuation schemes and unit trusts.
Current restrictions on referring to a security as being ‘secured' are extended to all securities. The nature and point in ranking of any security must also be included in advertising.
Statements about rates of interest must include references to minimum subscriptions or minimum investment periods.
Advertisements are prospectuses won't be able to state or imply that securities are safe or without risk, or that either the Securities Commission or Registrar of Companies has approved them.

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