The New Zealand sharemarket has soared upward during morning trading today.
The sharemarket's benchmark NZX-50 index has topped the 2800-point mark for the first time in nearly three months.
The market has risen strongly in the past two months, since falling to a five-year low close to the 2400 level at the start of March.
Helping pull the market higher today was leading stock Telecom, which opened up 12c to $2.86, its highest level in nearly seven months.
Soon after, Telecom shares slipped to be up 9c to $2.83, but that was enough when added to yesterday's 11c gain, to more than wipe out Friday's 19c loss.
Around 11.25am the NZX-50 was up 55 points, or nearly 2 per cent, to 2821, on top of yesterday's 46.4-point rise.
Among stocks to make big gains early Rakon was up 14c to $1.46, Sky City gained 8c to $2.78, The Warehouse up 7c to $3.85, Contact Energy up 6c to $5.90, Fletcher Building up 5c to $6.95, Freightways up 5c to $299, Port of Tauranga up 5c to $5.55, and Sky TV up 5c to $4.20.
Stocks rising 4c early included Fisher & Paykel Appliances to 55c, Mainfreight to $4.59, and Steel & Tube to $3.00.
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The strong start followed a rally by stocks in the United States as investors bet banks' capital shortfalls may be manageable and housing data fuelled hopes the recession was easing.
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 2.6 per cent to 8426.74, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index gained 3.4 per cent to 907.24 - its first close above the 900 level since early January, and the Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 2.6 per cent to 1763.56.
The broad S&P 500 turned positive for the year 2009, but it is still off 42 per cent from its October 2007 record high.
- NZPA
Sharemarket hits three-month high
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