NZ stocks: Powerco trade, debut of Turners & Growers NZX standouts

6.12pm


Trade in takeover target Powerco and market newcomer Turners & Growers hogged the limelight in a session that saw the index of top 50 stocks reach a new high.

There was $63.5 million worth of Powerco shares traded today, representing 44 per cent of the $144.2m on market.

Hamilton Hindin Greene broker Grant Williamson said the hefty trade was offshore buyers with arbitrage in mind.

Powerco shares firmed 1c to 212, still below the 215c a share offer by Australian firm Prime Infrastructure.

A Takeovers Code exemption allowed Prime to offer offshore investors cash for their parcels, while domestic investors were offered a mix of cash and unsecured bonds

"It's putting Prime in a difficult situation as more shares change hands each day," Mr Williamson told NZPA today.

Prime is looking to build on its existing 53.65 per cent of Powerco.

"It would seem they're going to have to pay more cash than they would have thought, or domestic holders get a higher ratio of bonds," Mr Williamson said.

"I'm not sure which way it's going to go. Someone's going to end up with more bonds or Prime has to pay more cash.

"It's getting exciting. There'll be a lot of domestic holders who are not happy with the situation and are not getting treated equally with foreign investors."

Meanwhile, the NXSX-50 index was up 1.71 points at 2828.54, a fresh closing high. The NZSX-All capital index was up 1.25 points at 940.57.

Among the 157 stocks traded were 70 rises and 33 falls.

Shares in Telecom were unchanged at 591, $10.5m worth changing hands today.

Excluding Powerco shares, Mr Williamson said trade on NZX was slight. Carter Holt Harvey shares were down 4c at 225 on turnover of $6.7m.

Shares in Turners & Growers closed at 335, a 15c premium to their debut price of 320 today. The stock was previously traded on the unlisted market.

"Looking at that investment profile they've issued, it puts them on pretty pricey fundamentals at this stage," Mr Williamson said.

"Of course that company looks to have a lot of potential," he said, noting Turners & Growers shares peaked at 342c in intra-session trade.

Auckland International Airport was down 5c at 715 after it today said it was seeking ways to improve road access to the airport.

Contact Energy was up 1c to 601, adding to its 10c gain yesterday.

The stock had slumped 13c on Monday, after independent directors said a 557c a share takeover offer by Australia's Origin Energy was unfair.

Valuations put Contact shares in the 569c to 634c range.

Eftpos machine firm Cadmus today said it was acquiring Wellington-based Efpos Ltd. Cadmus shares were up 0.5c at 14.5.

Shares in Fisher & Paykel Healthcare slipped 10c to 1510, having been steadily on the rise since mid August.

Other stocks on the move included: Air NZ down 2c at 177, Austral Pacific up 4c at 380, Hellaby up 3c at 598, Lion Nathan up 20c at 788, Michael Hill International up 11c at 711, Nuplex up 5c at 517, Telstra down 6c at 498, and Wrightson up 2c at 150.

Overseas, the Dow Jones closed up 88.86 points at 10,077.40, the Standard & Poor's 500 ended up 6.54 points at 1110.06, and the Nasdaq Composite ended up 9.99 points at 1869.87.

- NZPA