Joyce admits convention centre cost exposure, NZX new capital market, retrospective applications for overseas entities to buy NZ land and more

In today’s NBR Print Edition: Despite promoting its controversial deal with SkyCity [NZX:SKC] to build a world-class giant convention centre in Auckland as involving no up-front cost to the Kiwi taxpayer, the government has now tacitly conceded the public purse is likely to take a hit on the project. Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce has confirmed to reporter Nick Grant that SkyCity is not currently contractually obliged to cover any cost overruns beyond the original $402 million estimate for the centre.

Comparisons with unreal worlds peppered economy discussions this week. But as Rob Hosking writes, when Goldilocks fell asleep in the most comfortable bed she could find, she woke up with some large, menacing bears looming over her.

Official figures show last year more than 13% of requests for permission to buy land through the Overseas Investment Office (OIO) were made after the land was sold. But as one legal expert tells court reporter Victoria Young, retrospective applications for overseas entities to buy New Zealand land are simply a fact of life for the regime as it has broad criteria.

Ambitious small companies will have a much wider funding pool to access this year with the advent of equity crowdfunding and the launch of the NZ Exchange’s  [NZX:NZX] new capital market. Business reporter Calida Smylie reports.

The “woe is me” brigade has been complaining loudly since currency speculators were caught short by the removal of one major instance of market intervention. But should traders be surprised when these supports are suddenly taken away because they are distortionary or an effective subsidy by taxpayers to money or share speculators? Nevil Gibson asks.

Meanwhile, Michael Coote wryly notes how the Reserve Bank (recent recipient of the Central Bank of the Year Award) has gone quiet on the merits of currency intervention.

Rob Hosking devotes his Order Paper to the political year ahead: treating with the imposters of Triumph and Disasters.

The colossal opportunities and challenges to upgrade almost 1.1 billion hectares of Maori freehold land has come under the spotlight following the release of a PwC report. Jamie Ball reports.

New Zealand parents with two children can expect to pay up to $630,000 to get them through private school, according to new research. Duncan Bridgeman reports.

Islam’s clash with the West: The choice is not between secular democracy and religion but whether to stay within a system, writes Nathan Smith.

Meanwhile, Stephen Jacobi wonders if the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations are not concluded soon, we may need to move on to something else.

Heartland columnist Jacqueline Rowarth has a warning for employers about “post-holiday syndrome” – workers becoming restless.

Ad Media writer Campbell Gibson checks in on the top 10 advertisers of 2014, finding a couple of surprises.

In property, new NBR reporter Sally Lindsay reveals what developers of the biggest block of Auckland land given Special Housing Area status say are the underlying causes of the city’s housing affordability crisis.

Connal Townsend of the Property Council presents three ways to ease the building crisis.

All this and more in today’s National Business Review. Out now.