Welcome to Today in Business - Powered by Spark for Business, an experimental AI podcast by the New Zealand Herald. Each weekday, we bring you five stories, the best of the New Zealand Herald business journalism, summarised and delivered by an AI voice as an easily digestible recap. It's Tuesday, October 21, 2025, and here are five stories you should know about. Finance Minister Nicola Willis sought urgent Treasury advice on improving Reserve Bank oversight after Adrian Orr's resignation as governor in March. Treasury proposed removing the governor from the board to strengthen accountability, but Reserve Bank chair Neil Quigley opposed the idea, saying it would diminish the role's status and international standing. Willis accepted that advice but later introduced a Financial Policy Committee to oversee prudential regulation. The committee will include board members, the governor and external experts. Dr Anna Breman becomes governor on December first, succeeding Christian Hawkesby. Treasury says the change will help the board focus on governance. In other news, Alliance Group farmer-shareholders have approved the $270 million sale of a 65% stake to Ireland's Dawn Meats. The cooperative's members retain 35%. Alliance says more than 87% of the 2,675 shareholders who voted backed the proposal, exceeding the required threshold. Chair Mark Wynne says the result confirms confidence in the company's direction. About $200 million from the investment will repay debt, with the rest for capital projects. Shareholders also gain planned distributions worth up to $20 million annually. The Meat Industry Association reports August red meat exports rose 22% year-on-year to $717 million. Elsewhere, a major Amazon Web Services outage disrupted New Zealand businesses and global platforms including Sky TV, TVNZ+, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Google, Zoom, and Fortnite. The 15-hour disruption affected access to cloud-based services such as accounting platform Xero. Doug Graham from The Bean Machine says his company couldn't complete bank reconciliations or invoices during the outage. Xero confirmed some customers faced login issues while Amazon worked to restore systems. Amazon later announced services had "returned to normal operations" and promised a report on the incident's cause once technical issues were fully resolved, according to international media reports. In a separate development, Torpedo7 will return to being an online-only retailer by February 2026. Owner Tahua Group, which purchased the brand from The Warehouse Group for one dollar in 2024, will convert all remaining stores into The Outlet format. Managing director Roger Harper says the move protects the business and refocuses investment. Torpedo7 will trade through the 2025-26 summer season before clearance sales begin. The brand currently has stores in Albany, Newmarket, Taupō, Christchurch, Queenstown, and the Remarkables. Previously, The Warehouse Group reported a $60.3 million Torpedo7 loss for the 2024 financial year on $94.5 million in sales. Turning to the energy sector, Meridian Energy chair Mark Verbiest says Government participation in future capital raisings marks the biggest change since the company listed in 2013. Speaking at the annual meeting, he welcomed the Government's response to the Frontier Economics Report on the power sector. Meridian, 51% state-owned, posted a $454 million net loss in June after dry conditions and low gas availability. Chief executive Mike Roan says strong spring winds and new battery capacity are improving results. Meridian supplies about 30% of New Zealand's electricity. Verbiest notes an independent report found the market competitive and structurally sound. That was Today in Business - Powered by Spark for Business - your NZ Herald daily business summary. For the best in business, subscribe to Herald Premium at nzherald.co.nz.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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