Buy-back desperate attempt to prop up MRP price

Mighty River Power’s $50 million share buyback is an act of absolute desperation and shows the total folly of the Government’s asset sales programme, says Labour’s SOEs spokesperson Clayton Cosgrove.

“The asset sales programme has been a shambles from start to finish. It is the act of a desperate board that is trying to prop up its falling share price, just five months after listing. Clearly the Board could see the writing on the wall and knew the share price would fall even further.

“This is market interference, pure and simple. The Government will be very happy with this act as the falling Mighty River Power share price is scaring prospective Meridian investors away.

“The entire float was a shambles and the Government got it wrong from the beginning. It was clear within a week that the listing price was far too high. National was plain greedy.

“John Key and Bill English have long touted that selling off our SOEs will ‘deepen capital markets’. Surely an SOE spending $50 million to rescue its own falling share price isn’t what they meant. If MRP hadn’t been sold off that money could have used for the benefit of all taxpayers.

“This asset sales programme was a failure from the beginning, this is yet another nail in the coffin of this debacle.

“This shambles shows how important it is that New Zealanders vote in the upcoming referendum and put the asset sales programme out of its misery,” says Clayton Cosgrove.

ends

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