{"id":18325,"date":"2026-08-26T05:55:20","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T17:55:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=18325"},"modified":"2026-08-26T05:55:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T17:55:20","slug":"government-looks-to-tighten-up-wholesale-investment-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=18325","title":{"rendered":"Government looks to tighten up wholesale investment rules"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The government is\u00a0<a class=\"underline-brand-hover visited:text-foreground-secondary hover:visited:text-foreground-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rnz.co.nz\/news\/business\/716117\/nzx-backs-proposed-reforms-to-capital-markets\">looking to tighten up the rules covering wholesale investment offers<\/a>, amid concern the current rules are too permissive.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">A report by law firm Chapman Tripp says proposed reforms set out in a Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) discussion document could attract &#8220;significant industry pushback&#8221; particularly on the promotion of wholesale investment offers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The changes contemplated by MBIE focus on whether:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text leading-normal [&amp;_li&gt;ol.list]:!mt-4 [&amp;_li&gt;ol.list]:!pb-0 [&amp;_li&gt;ul.list]:!mt-4 [&amp;_li&gt;ul.list]:!pb-0 [&amp;_li]:!mb-8 [&amp;_ol]:pb-4 [&amp;_ul]:pb-4\">\n<ul class=\"list [&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">\n<li class=\"\">The eligible investor test is too permissive<\/li>\n<li class=\"\">The two-year renewal cycle for investor certification is too short<\/li>\n<li class=\"\">The promotion of wholesale offers to the general public should be more tightly constrained<\/li>\n<li class=\"\">The various thresholds for wholesale investor status should be adjusted.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">Chapman Tripp partner Penny Sheerin said wholesale investment offers were not suitable for inexperienced investors.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">&#8220;The risk to people offering these deals at the moment is that they have investors who are unsuitable within their investor base, who are really retail investors, who are perhaps inappropriately certifying themselves as eligible investors because they wish to participate in a wholesale offer that may appear attractive to them, but isn&#8217;t actually suitable for them based on their level of experience in investing,&#8221; Sheerin said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The Chapman Tripp report also warned there were risks the regulations could go too far.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">&#8220;So, for example, I think going too far would be licensing wholesale offerors,&#8221; Sheerin said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">&#8220;That would be something that we wouldn&#8217;t support, particularly given the global portability of capital and the risk that New Zealand investors may just then simply invest offshore.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The report said some of the reforms could add unnecessary compliance costs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The partners said concerns about inappropriate advertising of wholesale offers were legitimate, but it was critical that the detailed implementation did not unduly restrict capital-raising in the wholesale sector.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">&#8220;We are not aware of other countries seeking to licence wholesale offerors and would not support such a move given the global portability of capital and the risk that New Zealand investors may simply invest offshore,&#8221; the report said, adding there were better ways to manage the risks.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">The report said wholesale offers were already under the microscope through the Financial Market Authority&#8217;s (FMA) recent regulatory proceedings and enforcement actions, with an ongoing focus on wholesale issuer conduct, a thematic review in late 2022, and the High Court judgement\u00a0<a class=\"underline-brand-hover visited:text-foreground-secondary hover:visited:text-foreground-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rnz.co.nz\/news\/business\/537477\/fma-seeks-high-court-guidance-on-certificates-for-experienced-investors\">concerning eligible investor certificates<\/a>\u00a0in late 2025.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"font-serif-text mb-12 leading-normal\">\n<p class=\"[&amp;_em]:font-serif-text-italic [&amp;_cite]:font-serif-text-italic\">A High Court decision in September 2025 affirmed that eligible investor certificates could generally be relied on, unless there was reason for further investigation.<\/p>\n<p>rnz<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government is\u00a0looking to tighten up the rules covering wholesale investment offers, amid concern the current rules are too permissive. A report by law firm Chapman Tripp says proposed reforms set out in a Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) discussion document could attract &#8220;significant industry pushback&#8221; particularly on the promotion of wholesale investment [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":18326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18325","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18325"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18325\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18327,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18325\/revisions\/18327"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}