NZ sharemarket suffers from ex-dividend blues

The New Zealand sharemarket had another fall, dragged down by several leading stocks going ex-dividend. Its welcome half percent gain the day before was short-lived.

Thursday, September 14th 2023, 6:24PM

by BusinessDesk

The S&P/NZX 50 Index was on a gradual slide and closed at 11,313.53, down 43.58 points or 0.38%. The index has fallen on 10 of the last 12 trading days.

There were 61 gainers and 64 decliners over the whole market on volumes of 29.34 million share transactions worth $103.52m.

David McConnochie, investment adviser with Forsyth Barr, said it was another heavy day for income-generating stocks going ex-dividend.

“Generally, the dividend (payout) is shed from the headline share price, and the income part of the market is delivering to shareholders. But maybe there has been a bit of offshore selling over the last few weeks because of the strong US dollar,” he said.

“The local market is in a holding pattern waiting for the election off the back of the reporting season, and it has had a lot to digest lately with the release of the pre-election economic and fiscal update.”

The NZ dollar was trading at US59.28c against the American greenback, and US crude oil continued to stay high at US$88.41 a barrel. The Australian S&P/ASX 200 Index was up 0.49% to 7,189.2 points at 6pm NZ time.

United States inflation was slightly hotter than expected. Core inflation, stripping out energy and food, was 4.3% after the August consumer price index (CPI) increased 0.3% against an expected 0.2%. Core inflation fell from 4.6% in July and from 6.6% a year ago.

Annual headline inflation was 3.7%, up from 3.2% in the year ending July and more than the expected 3.6%. In August, the CPI rose 0.6%, the biggest monthly gain of the year, with oil prices reaching nine-month highs.

Food prices in NZ continued to rise. They increased 0.5% in August compared with the previous month and were 8.9% higher for the year. The increases were across the board – grocery up 10.6%, dining at 8.9%, meat and fish at 8%, non-alcoholic beverage at 9.1% and fruit and vegetables at 5.4%.

Going ex-dividend

Local stocks going ex-dividend were Spark, down 3.5c to $4.74; Fletcher Building, declining 8c or 1.76% to $4.46; Freightways, gaining 10c to $8.62; Tourism Holdings, up 1c to $3.70; NZME, shedding 1c to 91c; and PGG Wrightson decreasing 9c or 2.47% to 3.55.

Ebos Group was down $1.04 or 2.84% to $35.61; Fisher and Paykel Healthcare declined 23c to $21.52; Mainfreight decreased 52c to $66.28; and Comvita shed 7c or 2.17% to $3.16; and Napier Port was down 4c to $2.29.

In the property sector, Vital Healthcare Trust fell 5c or 2.36% to $2.07; Kiwis was down 2c or 2.33% to 84c; Argosy was up 2.5c or 2.28% to $1.12; and Property for Industry gained 4c or 1.78% to $2.285.

In the retail sector, Briscoe Group was up a further 5c to $4.66 following its solid half-year result; The Warehouse gained 7c or 4.19% to $1.74; and Hallenstein Glasson was down 10c to $5.75.

Auckland International Airport was down 8c to $7.85 after reporting a 27% increase in passenger volumes to nearly 1.48m in July – 84% of July 2018, the last full year before Covid struck. In August, total passengers increased by 29% to 1.45m – 87% of the pre-Covid level.

Other decliners were Vulcan Steel, down 14c to $8.95; Eroad falling 5c or 6.67% to 70c; South Port NZ shedding 22c or 2.95% to $7.25; CDL Investments decreasing 3c or 4.11% to 70c; Steel & Tube giving up 4c or 3.39% to $1.14; and 2 Cheap Cars down 2c or 3.17% to 61c.

Other gainers were Serko, up 5c to $3.90; Sanford, increasing 6c to $4.03; Booster Innovation, gaining 5c or 3.29% to $1.57; Pacific Edge, adding 0.009c or 8.11% to 12c; MHM Automation collecting 2c or 2.06% to 99c; and Just Life also up 2c or 5.41% to 39c.

Cinema management software firm Vista Group, down 2c to $1.57, made a presentation to investors in Los Angeles and talked about the future of its AI-enabled cloud platform and “premiumisation” of luxury auditoriums and seating, extended dining and enhanced technology.

Vista, which has a 50% global market share, said AI would boost moviegoer engagement, including dynamic pricing and operational efficiencies such as scheduling and labour management. Vista expected its annualised recurring revenue to be 15% or more from 2025.

Smartpay Holdings, down 3c or 1.82% to $1.62, said in its investor presentation that it was introducing an android merchandising terminal in Australia this year and in NZ next year. Smartpay has 46,000 terminals in the market, up 14% for the year.

Cannasouth, unchanged at 22c, told the market it had exported its first shipment of cannabis-based pharmaceutical ingredients to Australia.

Tags: Market Close