Weekly briefs

The Office of the Retirement Commissioner presents research reports, Tower on the go again, AMP Bank is here and more.

Sunday, October 18th 1998, 12:00AM

by Philip Macalister

The Office of the Retirement Commissioner has released two recently completed research reports. One is on the role of inheritance in the retirement income equation and the second looks at the prospects and potential of home equity conversion/equity release in New Zealand.
The former of these reports was prepared by Dr Adolf Stroombergen of Informetrics, while the latter was written by Judith Davey of the Victoria University.
A presentation on these two reports will be made in Wellington on Tuesday, October 20.

Copies of the reports (and the executive summaries) are available from the Office of the Retirement Commissioner.
For more on Home Equity conversion click here.

Tower on the go again
The Court of Appeal order stopping Tower Corporation from proceeding with its demutualisation plans has been lifted.
The restraining order (halting the process until November 2) was placed on the company to allow it and hostile bidder Guinness Peat Group (GPG) to sort out a deal over access to the group's membership list.
Such a deal has been settled and Tower can now apply to the High Court for a new hearing seeking provisional approval of its demutualisation plan.


AMP Bank starts
The Reserve Bank has granted AMP banking registration which will allow it to operate the business recently acquired from Citibank.
AMP/Ergo deputy general manager Philip McIntyre says AMP Bank started operating on October 15, and it is separate to the existing AMP/Ergo business.
The registration relates just to the Citibank business and AMP still has to gain separate registration to offer other banning products and services.
Once it has that registration it plans to roll out an American Express branded credit card, cheque books and revolving credit services.
AMP Bank in New Zealand is a branch of AMP Bank in Australia.


Merrill Lynch staff safe
Merrill Lynch's 70 staff in New Zealand are safe from the axe. The company, last week reported a third quarter loss if US$164 million, and plans to cut 3,400 jobs out of the organisation.
The cuts, which equate to five per cent of its workforce, will result in a one-off loss of US$288 million in severance costs.
Merrill Lynch is planning to offer some new products and services to New Zealand investors in November.


No conference coverage
Good Returns is unable to provide coverage of the Society of Independent Financial Advisers (SIFA) held in Rotorua on Friday and Saturday.
The conference was closed to media.
"The reason being that the conference was intended to focus internally on our members individual business by identifying and then addressing some of the major problem areas that many of us face," organiser Jim Hubble said.
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