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The Christchurch rebuild just got $10 billion more expensive, of which the government expects to provide $2 billion, Prime Minister John Key has told the National Party’s South Island regional conference. But that won’t stop the government forecasting to achieving its political totem of a return to fiscal surplus in the year to June 2015 in the annual budget, to …

Delegat’s Group has bought the assets of Australia’s Barossa Valley Estate out of receivership for A$24.7 million, just two months after snapping up the distressed vineyard and winery assets of Matariki Wines and Stony Bay Wines. The Auckland-based winemaker, whose stable includes the Oyster Bay brand, will acquire a 5,000 tonne winery, a 41 hectare vineyard in the Barossa Valley, …

The New Zealand dollar climbed above 85 US cents and reached the highest level against the Australian dollar since October 2009 as improving risk sentiment and the nation’s economic prospects drive demand for the kiwi. The kiwi dollar recently traded at 84.90 US cents, having climbed as high as 85.62 cents overnight, from 85.23 cents in Asia yesterday. The trade-weighted …

Better-than-expected US jobs data helped propel Wall Street as did corporate earnings that exceeded expectations such as from United Parcel Service. “Companies have gotten very good at controlling expectations. This has been a pattern of crunching down of estimates prior to earnings being released, and when earnings come out, they beat the number,” Stephen Massocca, managing director at Wedbush Equity …

Fonterra Cooperative Group’s managing director of the Asia Pacific/Middle East/Africa (APMEA) unit Mark Wilson will leave at the end of the month to attend to “family health matters” after overseeing a management restructure of the regional business. Chief executive Theo Spierings said Wilson had overseen the creation of the new APMEA unit in November when the Australia and New Zealand …

Warehouse Group, New Zealand’s biggest listed retailer, will reap a pretax gain of between $14 million and $15 million from the sale of Silverdale Centre in Auckland after developing the shopping complex on land it had owned for almost two decades. Listed property investors DNZ Property Fund agreed to buy the fully-leased property for $78 million in a move that …

APN News & Media, the publisher of the New Zealand Herald newspaper has shaken up its management structure, leaving out head of digital Matt Crockett, who was reportedly in the running for the top job. The Sydney-based media group has made chief development officer Crockett, a former head of Telecom New Zealand’s wholesale unit, redundant and replaced regional media division …

Air New Zealand’s shares jumped 5.6 percent after the national carrier flagged its annual earnings will more than double this year. The Auckland-based airline expects normalised annual pre-tax earnings, which strips outs unrealised movements in derivatives used to hedge its exposures, to be between $235 million and $260 million in the 12 months ended June 30. That compares to the …

Reserve Bank governor Graeme Wheeler kept the official cash rate at 2.5 percent, talking down the threat of soft inflation in recent months and reiterating his view the New Zealand dollar is “overvalued”. The kiwi jumped after the statement. “The high New Zealand dollar continues to be a significant headwind for the tradables sector, restricting export earnings and encouraging demand …

Infratil, the Wellington-based investment group managed by Morrison & Co, says its sale of up to $100 million of June 2022 bonds won’t open as planned today because it needs to amend the prospectus for the Labour Party-Greens power plan. “Although the prospectus discloses changes in the regulatory environment as one of the principal risks of an investment in infrastructure …