Rural Equities and interests associated with the Cushing family have built up a 17.7 percent stake in ASX-listed agribusiness Tandou. The Hawkes Bay farming group controlled by the Cushings bought an 11 percent parcel in Tandou for $7.9 million at an average price of about 43 Australian cents, Rural Equities said in a statement to the Unlisted platform. The investment …

Argosy Property will seek a 31 percent hike in the pool for directors’ fees at this month’s annual meeting as the company seeks to expand its board by two directors. Shareholders will be asked to approve lifting the fee pool to $655,000 from $500,000 at the Aug. 23 meeting in Auckland, the first lift since Argosy bought out its external …

The New Zealand dollar rose to its highest in almost two weeks as investors unwound bets the greenback would advance amid uncertainty about when the Federal Reserve will begin tapering monetary stimulus. The kiwi jumped to 80.17 US cents at 8am in Wellington, after earlier touching 80.46 cents, from 79.60 cents yesterday. The trade-weighted index increased to 75.27 from 74.90 …

Wall Street rose, stemming a three-day slide, as the latest exports data from China and Germany surpassed expectations, bolstering optimism about the economic recovery. China’s exports climbed 5.1 percent in July from a year ago, well above the 2 percent increase predicted in a Bloomberg News survey and also comfortably above the 3 percent forecast in a Reuters poll. It …

Former Commonwealth Bank of Australia chief Ralph Norris is to lead Fonterra Cooperative Group’s board inquiry into the botulism contamination scare, helped by former High Court judge Judith Potter and Chapman Tripp lawyer Jack Hodder QC. home based business ideas Norris, an independent director of Fonterra, will lead a committee of six that Smell lighter work Walgreens. My the best …

Fonterra Cooperative Group hasn’t seen any signs of customers reducing their business and says it is too soon to say whether the costs of dealing with the contamination will result in a charge against earnings. Chief executive Theo Spierings told a conference call today that with listed units on the NZX, Fonterra has obligations to disclose any significant financial impact. …

Vector, the electricity and gas lines company, is likely to beat its guidance in 2013 with a modest uplift in operating earnings but 2014 results will fall as regulated price cuts bite and it sells less cheap Kapuni gas. The Auckland-based company said in February with the release of its first-half results that full-year earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and …

Bathurst Resources says it’s received notice from the Environment Court that it will approve the company’s long-delayed and environmentally controversial application to do open-cast mining for coking coal on the Denniston Plateau. Bathurst had been in trading halt since yesterday afternoon. The shares did not move from the last traded price of 20 cents immediately following this morning’s announcement. Managing …

Shares in Diligent Board Member Services, the governance app maker hit by a slew of administrative mis-steps, surged after brokerage Craigs Investment Partners upgraded its recommendation to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’, saying a slump in the share price was overdone. Shares in New York-based Diligent jumped 11 percent to $6, making it the best performer on the New Zealand stock exchange …

Chorus’s board will probably have to cut its return to shareholders with promising signs in a government review of telecommunications law still likely to leave a hole in the network operator’s earnings, according to a broker’s report. While viewing the prospect of direct intervention in copper line pricing as a positive Craigs Investment Partners has cut its recommendation on Chorus …