The New Zealand sharemarket posted modest gains today helped by a 3.3 per cent rise in the price of Telecom shares.
The benchmark NZX-50 index rose 2.22 points, or 0.074 per cent, to 3002.328. Turnover was worth $80.2 million. There were 40 rises and 38 falls among the 112 stocks traded.
There was ample macro-economic news with a 25 basis point lift in the official cash rate in New Zealand, stronger than expected employment data in Australia and strong export data in China.
NZOG rose 5c to 141 after oil shows were reported at the Tui SW-2 exploration well in which NZOG has a 12.5 per cent stake.
"The market expected them to find oil given it is right next to an existing field," said James Lee, head of institutional equities at First NZ Capital.
Telecom closed up 6c at 187 with $20.26m worth of shares traded. It traded at a new record low of 179 yesterday.
Mr Lee said Telstra had risen 7.5 per cent in the last couple of weeks and Telecom had lagged. Telecom had simply bounced after a torrid run lower.
"I wouldn't read too much into it," he said. Most of the volume in the stock went through pre-market.
Tower gained 1c to 186, AMP rose 6c to 686 and Westpac rose 30c to 2800.
PGG Wrightson rose 1c to 53 after unveiling a restructuring of its business and Allied Farmers rose 0.2c to 4.7 after announcing the conditional sale of the second stage of the Five Mile project near Queenstown.
Nuplex Industries fell 1c to 287 after gaining 11c yesterday after the company encouraged investors by reaffirming its guidance.
Contact Energy eased 9c to 537, TrustPower eased 7c to 713 and Vector rose 1c to 211.
Fletcher Building fell 3c to 800 and Fisher & Paykel Healthcare eased 1c to 320.
Port of Tauranga eased 5c to 655. Guinness Peat Group eased 1c to 68.
In the United States, stocks fell in another late-day roller-coaster ride, dragged lower by BP and other energy shares as the US probe of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico deepened.
Banking shares also fell late, in sympathy with energy shares.
The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 0.4 per cent to 9899.25, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 0.6 per cent to 1055.69, and the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 0.5 per cent to 2158.85.
- NZPA
NZ shares post modest gains
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