NZ stocks: Market firms in quiet trade

12.00pm

The New Zealand sharemarket firmed this morning in quiet trade affected by the holiday in the United States market.

Volume of $22.2 million just after 11am was boosted by an $8.2 million offmarket purchase of Sky City shares at 626, topping the turnover by value. Having cleared the seller out of the way, the stock rose 7c to 635.

The NZSE-40 Capital Index was up 8.03 points to 2062.24 , up nearly 0.40 per cent.

Market leader Telecom was up 2c to 497 and Fletcher Building was up 1c to 272.

Waste Management rose 11c to 319 after it said its June half year result would "slightly exceed" its net earnings for the corresponding period last year.

Its earnings for the June 2001 half year were $6.7 million. Shareholders had been told at the company's annual meeting in April that this year's first half performance would be behind last year's result.

The result will be announced on August 8.

The other standout was BIL International, which jumped 5c to 70c. It traded as high as 71c -- its highest level since March last year. The company said yesterday it had trimmed its stake in Singapore beverage company Fraser and Neave and that former chief executive Greg Terry had resigned as a non-executive director.

Guinness Peat Group was up 2c to 170 after it completed its raid for 19.9 per cent of Rubicon yesterday. Rubicon was up 1c at 72c -- 3c below the price GPG paid. The Stock Exchange said it was powerless to force to buy 20 per cent of its purchase on market but that it was still investigating why the company failed to comply with exchange rules.

DB Breweries was down 15c to 585, Auckland Airport was up 1c to 421, and there was a 5c improvement in the Fisher and Paykel sisters, Appliances to 895 and Healthcare to 795.

Air New Zealand rose a cent to 66c after announcing yesterday a major upgrade to its fleet, switching to Airbus from Boeing.

Contact Energy was up 1c to 399. It announced today it was interested in certain of the Asia Pacific assets being offered for sale by Minneapolis-based NRG Energy Inc.

There were 30 rises and 14 falls among the 95 stocks traded.

- NZPA