NZ sharemarket pauses ahead of reporting season

The New Zealand sharemarket closed down slightly ahead of reporting season getting into swing next week.

Friday, May 17th 2024, 6:34PM

by BusinessDesk

The S&P/NZX 50 Index fell to a lunchtime low of 11,648.55 but recovered to close at 11,699.79, down 28.27 points or 0.2%.

The index was down 0.45% for the week. There were 63 gainers and 73 decliners over the whole market on light trading of 25.1 million shares worth $89.12m.

The sudden departure of The Warehouse Group (TWG) chief executive Nick Grayston caught the market's attention but the stock remained unchanged at an all-time low of $1.20.

Grayston stepped down after eight years in the role, with chair Joan Withers saying “as we look to the future, we have agreed a change in direction is necessary for the company and that it needs fresh energy to execute”.

Independent director John Journee will be the interim chief executive from Monday, and will stay on the board as an executive director. Journee was previously chief executive of Noel Leeming and has been on the board since 2013.

Paul Robertshawe, chief investment officer with Octagon Asset Management, said Torpedo 7 and TheMarket.com were Grayston’s ideas and they have been sold or shut down.

“The Warehouse tried new ventures and they effectively failed. They were big loss-makers and it was the right decision to shut them down,” Robertshawe said. “For Grayston to leave so quickly after being promised a succession plan is not that great.”

Robertshawe said the local market was very cautious and wary of the reporting season. The downgrades by Tourism Holdings, Fletcher Building and Spark, which is meant to be defensive, set the tone.

“The market has said ‘we expect bad news or show us otherwise’. That’s been tricky. But we’ve had no more earnings confessions by mid-May and if the company results are okay, then the market could turn quite quickly.”

SkyCity Entertainment was down 1c to $1.65 after reaching an agreement with Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre to pay a penalty of A$67m (NZ$73m) for anti-money laundering breaches at the Adelaide casino between December 2016 and mid-December 2022.

The agreement needs to be approved by the Federal Court, which will consider the agreed facts and admissions on June 7.

Contact Energy declined 15c to $8.85 after telling the market it is revising its development plans for a new geothermal plant on the Wairakei steam field because of increased costs.

Contact is likely to phase in the new plant, previously planned to be online in 2027, while keeping the existing geothermal station running longer – it has a consent to run the station up to June 2031.

Robertshawe said the Contact move questioned the difficulty for companies to build new power generation.

Among other energy stocks, Mercury was down 14.5c or 2.2% to $6.45; Meridian eased 7c to $6.10; Vector decreased 10c or 2.67% to $3.65; and Manawa was up 12c or 2.84% to $4.35.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare eased 15c to $28.91; Freightways was down 21c or 2.55% to $8.03; Ryman Healthcare declined 18c or 4.39% to $3.92; Summerset Group decreased 11c to $9.93; Chorus was down 9c to $7.20; and Rakon fell 8c or 8.25% to 89c.

Scales Corp rose 15c or 4.76% to $3.30 following its deal with fellow Hawke’s Bay apple grower Bostock Group. Scales said premium fruit is expected to represent nearly 80% of Mr Apple’s 2025 fruit sales (compared with 64% in 2023).

Mainfreight collected $1.25 or 1.85% to $69; Ebos Group was up 36c to $35.49, a2 Milk gained a further 12c to $7.29; and Move Logistics increased 3c or 8.11% to 40c.

Hallenstein Glasson increased 12c or 2.23% to $5.50; Turners Automotive was up 14c or 3.58% to $4.05; Serko rose 24c or 7.48% to $3.45; Heartland Group added 2c or 2.06% to 99c; and Allied Farmers gained 3c or 4.17% to 75c.

Investore, which owns 36 Woolworths supermarkets, was down 2c or 1.83% to $1.07 after reporting full-year revenue of $61.24m, up 1.64%, and a net loss of $67.11m resulting from a $98.7m reduction in the value of its $1 billion property portfolio.

Gross profit was steady at $35.1m and Investore’s net tangible assets per share is $1.57, down from $1.84.

Fellow property companies Argosy was down 2c or 1.82% to $1.08, and Property for Industry fell 12c or 5.41% to $2.10.

Tags: Market Close