Asia PacificRisk Management Limited provides tailored advice on financial risk, hedging solutions and corporate treasury management to the following organisations in New Zealand, Australia and Asia:

• Public-listed, state-owned and privately owned companies that have financial risk exposures arising from their business activities:-
  • Importers
    
  • Exporters
    
  • Borrowers
    
  • Commodity buyers/sellers
    
• Finance companies and building societies that have financial risk exposures on liquidity, funding and interest rate movements.
  
• Fixed Interest Investment funds/portfolios or organisations who themselves invest directly into approved debt securities.
  
• Government and Regional/Local Government bodies on debt raising/refinancing and interest rate risk management on debt and invested funds.
  

Asia-Pacific Risk Management Limited conducts its retained and one-off advisory assignment under formalised engagement/mandate letters with its clients that detail:-

• Scope, objectives and deliverables of the advisory project and retained relationship
• Timetable and assigned staff
  
• Advisory Fees - fixed amounts with agreed payment dates
  
• Confidentiality undertakings from both parties.
  
  

North Island provincial city and district councils have produced the lowest average debt funding costs over the last five years. The above analysis has been sourced from information available in the public domain (Financial Statements up to the year-end 30 June 2007) In addition, APRM requested all councils to correct their funding costs if the notes in their published financial statements stated an interest cost that did not include the results of risk managing with financial instruments.

The average interest rates are inclusive of all issuance/credit margins. Waitakere City Council's average interest cost over the last three years has been nearer 7.00%, high legacy funding costs pushed up their overall average in 2003 and 2004. Hamilton City Council and Kapiti District Council have recorded the most consistent lower funding costs. Councils who have substantially increased their debt levels over the last two years, thus commenced fixed rate borrowing at much higher market swap rates than the 2003 to 2005 period, include Rodney District Council and North Shore City Council.

Even taking into account lower borrowing/credit margins for Local Government compared to large corporate borrowers, the average funding cost for the Councils is below the average of the 20 corporate borrowers APRM surveyed in April 2007.