Mighty River offer fires blanks

Investors who pre-registered interest in Mighty River shares are sent blank emails; Treasury apologises

16th Apr 13, 10:52am by David Hargreaves

<a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/">Image sourced from Shutterstock.com</a>

Treasury has apologised after about 6000 would-be investors in Mighty River Power were sent emails with information missing when the partial float of the SOE was launched yesterday.

"Treasury has been advised by the website provider Reach Investor Solutions that a formatting error occurred with the first batch of emails, which resulted in pre-registrants receiving an unpopulated template," a statement from Treasury said.

"The correct email should have included the pre-registrant’s name and MRP reference number, and instead the fields were blank. There was no breach of privacy or other data integrity issue."

"The error was identified quickly and the emails were stopped, at which time around 6000 people had received the incorrect message. An apology is being sent to each of these pre-registrants this morning, with the correct details now provided."

"Treasury regrets this error occurred, and we are working with the website providers today to determine how the error got through quality assurance testing, and whether improvements are required."

About 440,000 people pre-registered their interest in buying MRP shares, which are being offered at between NZ$2.35 and NZ$2.80 a share.

The emails to pre-registrants are being sent out in batches of 20,000 and they advise the interested parties that the offer is open and outlining what they can do to participate. The offer closes on May 3.

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7 Comments

by Gareth Vaughan | 16th Apr 13, 11:56am 1366070160

A reader has asked via email that we point out one of Mighty River Power's directors (deputy chairman Trevor Janes) was a director of Capital + Merchant, which was tipped into receivership about 13 months after he left. This is disclosed in the MRP prospectus which the following is taken from:

"Trevor Janes joined the Mighty River Power board in June 2005. He is Chair

of Public Trust, Chair of Abano Healthcare, Deputy Chair of the Accident

Compensation Corporation and a director of ProCare Health. Trevor is

also a member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade International

Development Advisory and Selection Panel, a member of the New Zealand

Post Network Access Committee and an issuers’ representative on the

New Zealand Markets Disciplinary Tribunal. He was a director of finance company Capital +

Merchant Finance Limited from 30 March 2005 to 31 October 2006. That company was

placed in receivership on 23 November 2007 and in liquidation on 15 December 2009.

Trevor is a Chartered Accountant and Fellow of the Institute of Directors and the Institute of

Financial Professionals NZ Inc. He is a member of the CFA Institute (US) and the UK Society

of Investment Professionals."

It's also disclosed on MRP's website here - http://www.mightyriver.co.nz/About-Us/Governance/Board-of-Directors.aspx

And featured in an article by Fairfax columnist Chalkie here - http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/opinion-analysis/8267133/Mighty-River-d…

Capital + Merchant Finance owed NZ$167.1 million to about 7,500 investors when it was tipped into in receivership in November 2007. Investors have got nothing back. Then SFO boss Adam Feeley last year described Capital + Merchant's failure as being "as bad as anything which occured in the (finance company) industry."

http://www.interest.co.nz/news/60305/some-guilty-verdicts-hugely-compli…

by Stephen Hulme | 16th Apr 13, 2:51pm 1366080705

Hmmm - Trevor Janes also worked for O'Connor Grieve and Co, the same stock broking firm I worked for from 1978 to 1982.

Chalkie's article raises some important points:

So the commission decided who to charge based on their perceived responsibility, not on their proven defence under subsection 4.

This is perfectly acceptable under the solicitor-general's prosecution guidelines, which include evidential and public interest tests before prosecution takes place.

In essence, it appears Janes and Wright were seen as being not to blame for any alleged untruths in the prospectus.

Fair enough. Chalkie has no reason to believe otherwise.

Still, given the scale of the disaster at Capital + Merchant it would have been nice to have that decision made openly by the court, rather than privately by the commission and Crown Law.

Similar disquiet was raised more recently by media law expert Steven Price, in the EQC injunction case presided over by Justice David Collins . Read article

Media law expert Steven Price said the court ruling granting the EQC injunction contains shocking omissions.

"I think there may be good grounds for the injunction.

"But I am shocked that the court has failed to address basic aspects of the law," he said on his blog.

The most glaring omission was the court's failure to address the fact EQC had to show, "it is in the public interest to enforce secrecy".

Justice David Collins had also completely neglected to mention the public interest defence claimed by the blogger.

"Nor did the judge apply the Bill of Rights, despite the fact that he cannot by law grant an injunction that affects free speech rights unless he finds that to do so is demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.

"I would have thought there was a fair case to be made that the free speech interests here are strong ones: the blogger has alleged the email reveals incompetent and biased claims assessment.

". . . in the absence of a proper analysis of the legal principles, he (the judge) provides no reason for us to be confident that he's got it right."

Christchurch lawyer Margo Perpick, a partner of Wynn Williams, added to the controversy yesterday by saying the Ombudsman had already supported EQC's position "that information about homeowners' EQC claims can be withheld from the homeowners concerned".

The resonance with kiwifirst's views are deafening.

by Stephen Hulme | 16th Apr 13, 2:14pm 1366078461

by Rob | 16th Apr 13, 5:05pm 1366088724

I'm one of the 6000, so I am surprised it was just 6000. Mine said

Dear %name%

I have fund their website breaks under Opera, when you try to 'Apply' It pops up with an error that says' AJAX error' , and you can't go any further. Opera is used a lot on mobile devices, so not good that they haven't tested it for that.. It is a pretty poorly built website.

by midgetkiwi | 16th Apr 13, 9:53pm 1366105982

lol. how many millions are we spending on "support staff" and brokers to sell stuff to ourselves we already own? Good thing they are pros and don't make simple mistakes, because imagine what the potential big mistakes are.

by Roger Witherspoon | 17th Apr 13, 11:23am 1366154591

Perhaps It's better not said.

by Roger Witherspoon | 17th Apr 13, 11:35am 1366155346

Thanks Mist, but I got a bit concerned I might get meself in trouble there.