NZ stocks: Good gains in top stocks fail to lift NZ market

Sterling efforts from leading stocks, including a fresh high from Fisher & Paykel Appliances, kept the New Zealand sharemarket in the black today.

The Auckland-based appliance company jumped 45c, or 3.3 percent, to a fresh record of 1435 before closing at 1420 after announcing a global alliance with Whirlpool Corp, the world's biggest whiteware appliance company.

Following a more than 1 percent gain on Friday, the benchmark NZSX-50 gross index closed up 4.79 points today, or 0.22 percent, at 2207.03 while the top-40 capital index was up 0.26 percent at 2129.90.

Market leader Telecom closed down 3c at 527, on turnover of 3.90 million shares valued at $20.56 million.

Good retail sales figures today provided a boost for The Warehouse, up 16c at 503, Briscoe Group, up 6c at 178, and Pacific Retail Group, up 10c at 230.

A 1.5 percent rise in seasonally and inflation-adjusted June quarter retail sales beat economists' expectations of a 0.2 percent rise.

Stephen Wright of ASB Securities said the market was strong earlier today but eased slightly this afternoon.

"There's a few up and a few down, but overall it certainly seems firm albeit on light volumes," Mr Wright said.

Turnover of 25.42 million stocks was valued at $57.07 million.

"Where there's something happening or results pending, there's been some good interest in stocks. With F&P Appliances, they had their AGM and they seemed to be reasonably up-beat, plus this agreement with Whirlpool which should be good for it."

Companies to report financial results this month include Fletcher Building, Auckland International Airport, Air New Zealand and Independent Newspapers Ltd.

Fletcher Building gained 4c to a 4-1/2 year high of 419, Auckland Airport gained 5c to 603, Contact Energy was up 11c at 495, Independent Newspapers rose 2c to 420, Nuplex was up 5c at 380, Vertex gained 3c to 180, and Tourism Holdings was up 3c at 137.

AMP rose 10c to 510, off Friday's low of 500, Baycorp Advantage was up 8c at 186, Tower rose 1c to 124 and key shareholder Guinness Peat Group was also up 1c, at 158.

On the down side, Sky TV lost 7c to 468, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was down 7c at 1203, Carter Holt Harvey lost 1c to 164, NZX was down 9c at 480, casino company Sky City shed 1c to 928, and Promina lost 6c to 270.

Cadmus Technology rose 2.9c to 14 on news that Singapore's CET Technologies had invested $1.2 million to take a 9.9 percent stake in the eftpos machine maker.

The company has agreed to buy 16 million new Cadmus shares at 7.5 cents per share compared with Friday's price of 11.1c. The stock has risen from 6c in late April but is down from 17c a year ago.

Rises outnumbered falls 54 to 40, on the 135 stocks traded.

There was a mixed message from Wall St, with the Dow Jones industrial average up 64.64 points, or 0.71 percent, at 9191.09; the broader Standard & Poor's 500 Index up 3.47 points; and the Nasdaq down 8.15 points, or 0.49 percent, at 1644.03.

- NZPA