NZ market focused on aged-care stocks

Aged-care provider Summerset Holdings led the market higher after reporting solid free cashflow in its full-year earnings out today.

Friday, February 24th 2023, 7:11PM

by BusinessDesk

The S&P/NZX 50 Index rose 17.3 points, or 0.15%, to 11,905.75. Turnover was $160 million.

Hamilton Hindin Greene investment adviser Jeremy Sullivan said Summerset was a “very solid” result and showed there was plenty going on within the aged-care sector.

“Some good development margins and figures and the stock has performed well today,” he told BusinessDesk.

The retirement village operator today reported an underlying profit rose to $171.4m from $141.1m in 2021. Summerset shares were up 3.1% at $9.70.

The company reported steady-state free cashflows of $236.5m once villages are sold down and a $14.7m cash outflow for 2022.

That's still a sharp contrast with Ryman Healthcare, which has had negative cashflow for most of the last decade and isn’t expecting to turn positive until 2025.

Shares in Ryman Healthcare slipped another 0.9% to $5.40, today. The stock has fallen approximately 10% since it began to raise capital earlier this month.

Fonterra Shareholder Fund units were up 1.3% to $3.14 after the cooperative lowered and narrowed its forecast farmgate milk price. It now has a midpoint of $9.

Chief executive Miles Hurrell said the revision was due to softened demand, particularly from China, while supply was “balanced”.

Shares in Channel Infrastructure rose 2.8% to $1.47 today after announcing it would pay 7 cents in dividends on March 20.

The fuel import terminal reaffirmed its earnings guidance to between $82m and $86m, with a dividend between 9 and 11 cents per share.

Sandford shares rose 2% to $4.09 after the fishery firm said prices had improved in all divisions, although sales volumes were down, during the first quarter of the 2023 financial year.

Chief executive Peter Reidie said the company was “still in recovery mode” and the stronger prices were partly offset by increased costs for fuel, freight, salmon feed and labour.

Port of Tauranga reported an 11.3% increase in net profit and declining import and export volumes. Shares in the company ended the day up 1.6% to $6.30.

Delegat Group slipped 0.2% to $9.20, the winemaker reported a half-year operating profit up 2% at $40.2m and forecast the full-year result to be between $59m and $62m.

Metro Performance Glass was up 2.2% to 18.5 cents after chief executive Simon Mander said it was in the process of appointing an advisor to help it sell its Australian business.

Australian Glass Group has made “significant improvements” to its operational and financial performance and was expected to contribute “significantly” to the group’s 2023 earnings – which are forecast to be $11m or $12m, up from $5.9m

Shares in Pushpay edged back to $1.29 today, having fallen as low as $1.26 over fears the takeover deal would be voted down next week.

Arbitrage traders and hedge funds don’t want to be left holding the stock if the scheme of arrangement fails. The recovering share price could possibly reflect higher confidence in the deal going ahead.

Scales shares recovered some ground, climbing 1.5% to $3.35, having previously been sold off by investors after Cyclone Gabrielle damaged some of its apple orchards.

Australasian travel booking company Serko also jumped 6.4% to $2.50 by early evening.

The New Zealand dollar was trading at 62.4 US cents at 3pm in Wellington, little changed from 62.3 cents yesterday.

BNZ’s Doug Steel said the NZ dollar had stayed between 62.1 and 62.5 US cents but tested the bottom of that range this morning when the US dollar strengthened.

The kiwi has held its strength against the Australian dollar as the yield gap between the two countries has widened and Australian wage data weakened.

It was trading at 91.5 Australian cents, up from 91.3, while the trade-weighted average was at 71.12, up slightly from 71.09.

Tags: Market Close