Ryan Bridge: Something's not adding up with business investment in this country

If the Post is to believed this morning, the Government is considering a business growth fund whereby some crown agency would pick winners and probably a few losers with financial backing.

Chalmers did this in Australia.

There was apparently a meeting in April between Willis and Chalmers to talk about us joining his fund.

We're talking about minnows with revenue between one and ten million.

Unless the gas transition guarantor was the start of some kind of paradigm shift in the way this government thinks about private enterprise, then investment decisions in the private sector would be left to, well, the private sector.

Capital funds and even KiwiSaver.

We have about 5% of KiwiSaver funds invested in private equities. The Aussies are apparently more like 15 to 20%.

Fund managers have been making noises about changes needed to help encourage such investments.

So why don't we? If needs be.

The other unusual one this week was the Golden Visa. Apparently, there aren't enough investment opportunities out there to soak up the billions these guys want to pump in to score bunker in Queenstown with mountain views.

So now you can donate to charity or even help fund a DOC walking trail upgrade.

Erica Stanford told me yesterday they're looking at broadening out the types of investments that qualify.

We ether have too many investment opportunities and not enough capital, or not enough capital and too many opportunities.

Or we have regulatory settings that are stopping one from feeding the other, in which case, government ought cut through them before picking its own winners.

Ryan Bridge is a New Zealand broadcaster who has worked on many current affairs television and radio shows. He currently hosts Newstalk ZB's Early Edition - where this article was sourced.