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Business valuations
We offer expert valuation advice in transactions, regulatory and administrative matters, and matters subject to dispute – valuing businesses, shares and intangible assets in a wide range of industries.
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Capital markets
You need corporate finance specialists experienced in international capital markets on your side if you’re buying or selling financial securities.
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Complex and international services
Our experience of multi-jurisdictional insolvencies coupled with our international reputation allows us to deliver the best possible outcome for all stakeholders.
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Corporate insolvency
Our corporate investigation and recovery teams can help you manage insolvency situations and facilitate the best outcome.
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Debt advisory
An optimal funding structure for your organisation presents unprecedented opportunities, but achieving this can be difficult without a trusted advisor.
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Expert witness
Our expert witnesses analyse, interpret, summarise and present complex financial and business-related issues which are understandable and properly supported.
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Financial models
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Forensic and investigation services
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Independent business review
Is your business viable? Will it remain viable in the future? A thorough independent business review can help your organisation answer these fundamental questions.
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IT forensics
Effective ESI analysis is integral to the success of your business. Our IT forensics experts have the technical expertise to identify, preserve and interrogate electronic data.
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Mergers and acquisitions
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Raising finance
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Relationship property services
Grant Thornton offers high quality independent advice on the many financial issues associated with relationship property from considering an individual financial issue to all aspects of a complex settlement.
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Restructuring and turnaround
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Transaction advisory
Our depth of market knowledge will steer you through the transaction process. Grant Thornton’s dynamic teams offer range of financial, commercial and operational expertise.
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Corporate tax
Grant Thornton can identify tax issues, risks and opportunities in your organisation and implement strategies to improve your bottom line.
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Employment tax
Grant Thornton’s advisers can help you with PAYE (payroll tax), Kiwisaver, fringe benefits tax (FBT), student loans, global mobility services, international tax
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Global mobility services
Our team can help expatriates and their employers deal with tax and employment matters both in New Zealand and overseas. With the correct planning advice, employee allowances and benefits may be structured to avoid double taxation and achieve tax savings.
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GST
GST has the potential to become a minefield and can be expensive when it goes wrong. Our technical knowledge can help you minimise the negative impact of GST
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International tax
International tax rules are undergoing their biggest change in a generation. Tax authorities around the world are increasingly vigilant, especially when it comes to global operations.
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Research and Development
R&D tax incentives are often underused and misunderstood – is your business maximising opportunities for making claims?
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Tax compliance
Our advisers help clients manage the critical issue of compliance across accountancy regulations, corporation law and tax. We also offer business and wealth advisory services, which means we can provide a seamless and tax-effective offering to our clients.
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Transfer pricing
Tax authorities are demanding transparency in international arrangements. We businesses comply with regulations and use transfer pricing as a strategic planning tool.
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Audit methodology
Our five step audit methodology offers a high quality service wherever you are in the world and includes planning, risk assessment, testing internal controls, substantive testing, and concluding and reporting
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Audit technology
We apply our audit methodology with an integrated set of software tools known as the Voyager suite. Our technology has been developed to produce quality audits that are effective and efficient.
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Financial reporting advisory
Our financial reporting advisers have the expertise to help you deal with the constantly evolving regulatory environment.
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Business architecture
Our business architects help businesses with disruptive conditions, business expansion and competitive challenges; the deployment of your strategy is critical to success.
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Cloud services
Our team is led by cloud business experts who tailor services to the needs of your organisation, from strategy and implementation to ongoing services assurance.
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Internal audit
Our internal audits deliver independent assurance over key controls within your riskiest processes, proving what works and what doesn’t and recommending improvements.
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IT advisory
Our hands on product experience, extensive functional knowledge and industry insights help clients solve complex IT and technology issues
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IT privacy and security
IT privacy and security should support your business strategy. Our pragmatic approach focuses on reducing cyber security risks specific to your organisation
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Organisational & cultural change
The key to sustainable and future growth is a unified organisation operating within a strong cultural context, where transparency and communication are the priority for Kaimahi, and where visible leadership means walking the talk – but where does that journey begin?
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Payroll assurance
Our specialist payroll assurance team can conduct a review of your payroll system configuration and processes, and then help you and your team to implement any necessary recalculations.
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PCI DSS
Our information security specialists are approved Qualified Security Assessors (QSAs) that have been qualified by the PCI Security Standards Council to independently assess merchants and service providers.
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Process improvement
As your organisation grows in size and complexity, processes that were once enabling often become cumbersome and inefficient. To maintain growth, your business must remain flexible, agile and profitable
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Procurement/supply chain
Procurement and supply chain inputs will often dominate your balance sheet and constantly evolve for organisations to remain competitive and meet changing customer requirements
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Project assurance
Major programmes and projects expose you to significant financial and reputational risk throughout their life cycle. Don’t let these risks become a reality.
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Risk management
We understand that growing companies need to establish robust internal controls, and use information technology to effectively mitigate risk.
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Robotic process automation (RPA)
RPA is emerging as the most sophisticated form of automation used to help businesses become more agile and remain competitive in the face of today’s ongoing digital disruption.
Budget 2013: Chance to leave a legacy with RMA
Chance to leave a legacy with RMA
Every leader wants to leave a legacy to mark their time at the helm. Be they politicians, chief executives, sportspeople or school principals, everyone wants to be remembered as someone who made a difference.
New Zealand sport, business and education can point to many who will be remembered for their deeds, dedication and actions that have made New Zealand a better place.
Unfortunately, the roll call for politicians ‘who have made a difference’ would be short - with most of those mentioned now deceased. Probably the last New Zealand politicians to leave a legacy were David Lange with his nuclear free policy and Roger Douglas’s economic restructuring of the 1980’s some 30 years ago.
There is an opportunity right now for someone else to step up to the plate and carve their place in history. How? By being the person that takes the Resource Management Act (RMA), that trailblazing piece of legislation of 22 years ago, and fashions it to the benefit of all New Zealanders.
It won’t be this year, as the Government pays lip service to the far-reaching changes that are required. Some would say that the RMA has been the most important piece of legislation passed in New Zealand in the last 20 years, yet the Government, in its last round of tinkering, gave a consultation period of only 22 days – that’s less time than Super Rugby coaches get to prepare for a season.
Hopefully, the Budget will reveal that the Government is indeed serious about this topic. It is definitely sitting in the too-hard basket, but legacies are made by those who successfully tackle the seemingly impossible.
Let’s not kid ourselves, this is not a piece of legislation that will be fashioned by one Budget or one election promise, it will take a great investment of time, co-operation and skill.
How difficult will it be? It’s like mixing black and white and coming out with a nice bright colour. For example, Greenpeace describes the Resource Management Act as a set of laws that’s designed to protect all that gives New Zealanders a unique quality of life and says the current Government plans to strip out the core principles– the bits that actually protect the environment and give people a say in what happens in their backyard – and rewrite laws to suit big business.
In the words of Environment Minister Amy Adams: “New Zealand’s frustration with the Resource Management Act (RMA) is rife. The way the RMA’s processes are operating is costing us all in time, money and lost opportunities. The systems have become cumbersome, uncertain and highly litigious. The money spent on having to fight to get ahead or to defend your position is money that our households and businesses are missing out on.”
And to be fair to the Minister, there are many who stand far to the right of her regarding the RMA.
So what do we want to see?
First and foremost, the RMA has to be cognisant of the economic factors that it influences. New Zealand is littered with examples where opportunities have been lost because the cost of getting an idea on to a working plan is just far too great. A contentious example of this is the $8.8 million Meridian Energy recently spent trying to gain resource consent for the Project Hayes wind farm, before pulling the plug in January 2012.
Unnecessary delays have seen investors, many from overseas – wanting to spend their money in this country, head elsewhere because it’s less costly, with fewer hoops to jump through and shorter delays. There must be a balance – the philosophies of Greenpeace need to be matched alongside those of the property developer – but New Zealand cannot be held back by unreasonableness.
And we have to get the Government and local bodies working more closely together
To achieve legacy status, leaders need courage, stamina, brilliance and a great faith in their own convictions, as all elements will be shaken at some stage. For the RMA to be turned into something meaningful, it’s going to take this level of commitment from the Government.
Unfortunately, we are only tinkering at present – 22 days simply is not enough time for a full consultation, the fact there are 14,000 submissions is a pretty good indicator of the importance New Zealanders place on the proposed changes. Hopefully, there is a sign of further intent in the Budget, but we are not holding our breath.
Solve it, and the legacy is born.
Further enquiries, please contact:
Alastair Boult
Grant Thornton New Zealand National Director, Government Advisory
T +64 (0)4 495 1724
E alastair.boult@nz.gt.com