NZ stocks: Big leap bowls brokers

The sharemarket, like the New Zealand cricketers' bowling attack, produced a positive surprise yesterday.

The 1.4 per cent rise was against the negative backdrop of a sharp fall on Wall St on Friday ahead of their long weekend and Air New Zealand's half-year profit, described as "plain nasty" first thing in the morning.

"It was just one of those days which you can't really explain, but we'll take it," said JP Morgan executive John Rattray.

Don Turkington of Cavill White said there were some chunky orders in the market.

He said that, while a good day, it was worth noting that the indicator NZSE-40 capital index was still knocking on the door of 2000. It closed 28 points up at 1994.41.

Volume was a healthy $100 million, given that the US market was on holiday.

Telecom made a strong comeback, rising 16c to $5.34, well above the sub-$5 level it hit on Monday. Brokers said there were some positive rumours in the market about Telecom, although they declined to elaborate. Mr Rattray said Telecom was unlikely to break out of a volatile range until it had resolved the situation in Australia.

Air New Zealand A shares fell 7c to $1.54 and the Bs 1c to $2.03 after the company reported a half-year net profit of just $3.8 million, down from $127.2 million.

"It was a pretty ordinary result," said Deutsche Securities' Shane Gavegan. "The market will be disappointed by that." He said nothing had changed to solve Air NZ's problems - the New Zealand and Australian dollars remained weak and fuel prices high.

"There's still a double whammy on Air New Zealand looking forward. Until those things improve, it doesn't matter how many passengers they are getting."

Fletcher Building and Energy each had a good day. Energy closed up 14c at $8.90 while Building added 8c to $2.35. Dr Turkington said the market had over-reacted to the resignation of CEO-elect Alexander Toldte and the stock had merely recovered.

Brierley Investments, led by chief executive Greg Terry, ended 1c higher at 36c despite being 30 per cent owner of Air NZ. Its British hotels group, Thistle, has been having a good run.

Carter Holt Harvey had a peek at $1.70c, closing 4c higher at $1.69. Baycorp, expected to produce a bumper result today, rose 40c to $12.50.

Fisher & Paykel, which on Monday confirmed plans to split, had an outstanding day, rising 23c to $8.48.

Sky City climbed further ahead after its better-than-expected result on Monday. It rose 15c to $9.28.

Two others to perform strongly were The Warehouse, up 19c to $5.46, and Wrightson, up 7c to 78c.

Genesis continued its fall despite news that its Phase II Pvac drug trials had been successful. It dropped 40c to $5.80.

Ports of Auckland ended 5c up at $5 after it reported a steady half-year profit of $20.9 million.

- NZPA