NZ shares finish week down 1%

New Zealand's benchmark share index was up on Friday but not enough to erase the week's losses. NZME led the market after it struck a preliminary deal for Google to pay for some of its news content.

Friday, March 25th 2022, 6:10PM

by BusinessDesk

The S&P/NZX 50 Index rose about 40 points, or 0.3%, to 12,055. Turnover was $160 million.

Tina Teng, a markets analyst at CMC Markets, said Asian markets were prepped for a strong open after a tech-led rebound on the US markets overnight.

“[Computer] chip stocks led broader market gains as investors continue to take bets on growth stocks despite the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war and economic uncertainty,” she said.

Local investors were more focused on domestic news coming from listed companies today, including NZME which led the market with a near 8% jump to $1.65.

NZME announced it had signed a letter of intent to join Google’s News Showcase service which will mean the media company withdraws from a collective bargaining effort.

The company said the in-principle agreement was likely to boost revenue and said earnings in the 2022 financial year would likely be between $62m and $67m.

“The increasing likelihood of a deal with Google and potentially Meta would provide another important source of new revenue for NZM,” said Arie Dekker, Jarden’s head of research.

He said Jarden was taking a “cautious approach” to estimate how much revenue the deal would result in but sees it adding about $3m to annual revenue, with scope for it to grow to $5m.

Dekker withdrew his ‘buy’ recommendation as the stock has hit his 12-month target, even after he increased it to $1.63 today.

Mainfreight jumped 4.7% to $83.79 after bouncing from an 8-month low of $76 less than ten days ago.

Tourism Holdings was up 2.8% at $2.91 after the Commerce Commission signed off on its sale of Mighway and ShareACamper businesses to Camplify Holdings for just under $8m, paid in equity.

Hallenstein Glasson shares fell 3.6% to $6.36 after it reported first-half net profit was down 40% due to pandemic-related shutdowns.

Z Energy climbed 0.3% to $3.74 after its shareholders voted in favour of Ampol’s takeover bid at $3.76 per share. The deal is still waiting on Commerce Commission approval.

Meridian Energy and Ryman Healthcare were weighing down the benchmark index, each falling about 2.5% to $5.04 and $9.57, respectively.

The NZ dollar mostly held its ground against the US dollar, trading at 69.61 cents today, but CMC’s Tina Teng said the rally may be pausing here.

“From the technical perspective, the three major commodity currencies might be losing steam against the USD in the near term, given a combining signal of the indicators,” she wrote in a note.

Commodity currencies – such as the NZ dollar – have been strengthening through the course of the war-induced price spikes of global commodities.

Tags: Market Close