NZ stocks: Last minute rally maintains winning streak

A last minute rally saw the benchmark sharemarket index eke out a gain and notch up its seventh consecutive positive session today.

Despite recent data pointing to an economic downturn next year, if not a dreaded hard landing, investors have been happily pushing the sharemarket into a pre-Christmas rally over the past week.

After hovering in flat-to-negative territory for much of the day, the benchmark NZSX-50 index edged up 2.285 points at the close to 3319.33, while the NZSX-All capital index eased 0.58 points to 1004.79.

Bellwether stock Telecom was down 2c to 589, on turnover worth $35.3 million. Earlier in the day it was down as low as 583c, after the Commerce Commission ruled it had to open up its high speed internet broadband network to rival TelstraClear.

Telecom indicated it was likely to appeal the decision.

Telstra was up 7c to 419.

Contact Energy rose 7c to 637. Hamilton, Hindin, Greene partner Grant Williamson said this was mainly due to bargain hunters buying into the stock. "That stock has been sold down reasonably aggressively in the past few months," he said.

In its second day of trading Goodman Fielder fell 1c to 219.

"It's still marginally ahead of the application price, but in one and a half days of trading we've had a 7c price range, so [it's] not really getting investors too excited," Mr Williamson said.

But volumes were healthy, with 9.8 million Goodman shares worth $21.58 million changing hands today.

Carter Holt continued to trade at 250, in line with Graeme Hart's takeover offer. The offer is set to close this Friday, but under New Zealand regulations Mr Hart could choose to extend the offer up until February.

Property investor Property For Industry (PFI) gained 4c to 116, after it said today it was likely to clock up a $37 million annual gain when it revalued its portfolio at the end of this month.

Total market turnover today was worth $116 million.

- NZPA