AIR - Air NZ.

[Baa_Baa]

When all said and done its only a few hundred thou shares these management are moving, but each one has a magnifying effect because insiders are cashing up … suggesting recent SP is as good as it gets and they don't want the sunk capital or dividends. Still minnows judging by the volume moving, so it will pass, while we all try to figure out who the real money is that's moving the SP. Nice to see some objective balanced discussion and viewpoints.

[Poet]

The assumption that all the executives who sold are privy to all the numbers - normally that is not the case, just the CEO, CFO and directors.

AIR did release the presentation as Price Sensitive.

Agree however not a good look.

AIR's policy on share trading requires key personnel to obtain permission from CFO/CEO or board before buying or selling.

[Beagle]

"formal guidance for FY17 by AIR management themselves had not been formally issued before so technically one can't say it was a downgrade per se"

That's true in a strict sense Roger, but nevertheless presumably the management knew at least a week ago that they were going to inform the market in this week's investor briefing that next year's earnings would be below this year's earnings. So on the face of it, at the time they were dumping the free shares that we gave them for doing such a good job of looking after our interests, they were in possession of relevant insider information that had not yet been released to the market (that information could have been released a week ago, prior to their selling spree, but if they had done that maybe they wouldn't have got as much for those shares)

AIR's policy on share trading requires key personnel to obtain permission from CFO/CEO or board before buying or selling.

Agree with what you've said 110%. You have considerably more shares than I, would you like to take your concerns up with Chris Luxon or Tony Carter on other shareholders behalf mate ?
PM me if you need C.L.'s e.mail address.

[Beagle]

Are you really surprised?

Too much money invariably changes peoples standards .......

I am to be honest mate. These are people who's salary package is already extremely generous so they shouldn't need to sail anywhere near the line with their share transactions and I think that point needs to be made to them in a forthright manner. Maybe someone needs to write a letter to the editor of the herald pointing out all the management selling in the week leading up to the profit downgrade so AIR management get put under the spotlight for the wrong reason. The halo has slipped very badly here. While we are peering down the dark well that sailing so close to the wind with share sales represents...a real cynic might even ponder if certain AIR management had some advance knowledge about the likelihood of VAH posting such a grim Q3 result yesterday when they were selling last week ?..not suggesting they did or didn't just wondering... No matter how you slice and dice this thing...its not a good look. Really meaningful management share sales last week just before bad news on VAH on Monday and profit downgrade on Tuesday

[Poet]

Agree with what you've said 110%. You have considerably more shares than I, would you like to take your concerns up with Chris Luxon or Tony Carter on other shareholders behalf mate ?
PM me if you need C.L.'s e.mail address.

Might very well do that after some consideration Roger.

A couple of extra thoughts occur to me though

Firstly, I must admit that AIR management predicting a lower profit next year wasn't exactly a surprise to me (and I'm guessing it wasn't a surprise to you either, pretty much in line with our expectations as a cyclical company and we've discussed as much here before) so I can't really claim to be disadvantaged. My actions re my shareholding wouldn't have been different if they had announced this a couple of weeks ago

Secondly, I'm also inclined to believe that the share price might actually be lower now if the order of events had been reversed ie if they had announced the lowered 2017 profit expectation and then management had started to sell, what do you think?

[Beagle]

Might very well do that after some consideration Roger.

A couple of extra thoughts occur to me though

Firstly, I must admit that AIR management predicting a lower profit next year wasn't exactly a surprise to me (and I'm guessing it wasn't a surprise to you either, pretty much in line with our expectations as a cyclical company and we've discussed as much here before) so I can't really claim to be disadvantaged. My actions re my shareholding wouldn't have been different if they had announced this a couple of weeks ago

Secondly, I'm also inclined to believe that the share price might actually be lower now if the order of events had been reversed ie if they had announced the lowered 2017 profit expectation and then management had started to sell, what do you think?

Management should be aiming to follow the highest ethical standards and be seen to be doing so, i.e. perception is just as important as the execution of transactions themselves. Its not just about following the barest minimum legal rules as I've eluded too above. The $120m exchange rate matter caught me by surprise, (depending on future exchange rates some of this may be mitigated) as did the VAH loss, (more than hefty doses of flea powder is required there), so yes FY17 will be materially lower than I was previously expecting and if I'd known those things a couple of weeks ago I would not have added at $2.78.

I don't think it's worth getting into a theoretical about if they'd reversed the order...all that matters is are they in breech of the insider trading regulations and / or the companies own governance policies for management share transactions. What about the share sale referred to in the link above. Mr Morgan selling a whopping 350,000 shares one trading day before what amounts to a profit downgrade.

The other technicality management will cling too is this. The SP actually went up significantly after the release of information contained in today's investor briefing so management could make the case that it contained price sensitive information that was positive, (slightly bizarre I know). They could argue that their expectation of yield recovering in the medium term, (FY18 onwards) was good news for the company and DCF modelling using higher long term anticipated yields is a positive for the market. Another useful technicality for management to assert one thinks...

Time for dinner I think...its been an interesting day.

[winner69]

When all said and done its only a few hundred thou shares these management are moving, but each one has a magnifying effect because insiders are cashing up … suggesting recent SP is as good as it gets and they don't want the sunk capital or dividends. Still minnows judging by the volume moving, so it will pass, while we all try to figure out who the real money is that's moving the SP. Nice to see some objective balanced discussion and viewpoints.

The day the CFO hocked off nearly 400,000 shares that was just under 20% of the days turnover .... and that was just a week after he hocked off 200,000 odd

The 400,000 odd he got over $3 - must believe in TA and used TA as the signal to sell - Hoop would be proud of him

Like must accountants he pretty canny that CFO

Disclosure - think I read the notices properly

[axe]

is any one else having trouble viewing the AIR thread ? it keeps giving me an error "not found"

[winner69]

is any one else having trouble viewing the AIR thread ? it keeps giving me an error "not found"

Share price up 15 cents this week - was that what you couldn't find

[winner69]

Incentive schemes like this Air NZ one align management interests with those of shareholders - ie enhance/maximise shareholder wealth

So as Chris, Rob et al enrich themselves by playing within the rules of the game what's all the fuss about - after all they have shareholder's interests at heart