NZ stocks: Market ends week in black on high turnover

6.00pm

The New Zealand sharemarket had a lively end to the week with an upset for comeback kid Tranz Rail and high turnover in market leader Telecom.

The benchmark NZ50 capital index closed up 11.65 points, or 0.57 per cent, at 2044.77 while the top-10 index rose higher, closing up 0.81 per cent at 931.03.

Topping hefty turnover of 45.88 million stocks valued at $122.17 million, was Tranz Rail's 13.4 million shares.

Tranz Rail had four large trades of more than one million shares today, with market speculation picking Australia's Toll Holdings to raise its stake close to 10 per cent from its 6.1 per cent.

Tranz Rail shares plunged 20 per cent today after RailAmerica pulled its bid, falling initially 23c to 70c before closing down 15c at 78.

Andrew Kelleher of ASB Securities said there was still some confidence there was more action to come.

"Tranz Rail is still trading at 78, whereas when RailAmerica came in (last Thursday) it was languishing in the 40s.

"It's actually done a bit better on the day than I may have expected but that's due to the feeling the game's not over yet,"said Mr Kelleher.

Telecom, which closed down 1c at 511, was charging along despite not having extended its gains.

"There's obviously still buyers there -- how much of this is due to offshore guys wanting to take advantage of the currency and the good New Zealand story and escape US dollar weakness, I don't know," Mr Kelleher said.

"A pretty good day across the rest of the top-10, Auckland Airport did well after that statement this morning re cost controls."

The Government said today it has decided not to impose controls such as charging of fees at Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch Airports.

As a result, Auckland Airport rose 15c to a three-month high of 546, while two thirds owner of Wellington Airport Infratil was up 7c at a nine-month high of 195.

Other blue chips to rise were Contact Energy, up 8c at 468, Fletcher Building, up 13c at 348 on heavy turnover of 1.9 million shares, The Warehouse gained 1c to 445, Independent Newspapers Ltd was up 7c at 420, and its pay-TV asset Sky TV gained 8c to 430.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, which yesterday posted a 17 per cent lift in its March year net profit, fell 5c to 1065, while F&P Appliances rose 5c to 1075.

Financial services company Tower, about to launch a $200 million rights issue to recapitalise, was up 1c at 145, while AMP gained 3c to 570.

Richmond was up 3c at 317 as South Island rival PPCS closed its takeover offer of 311 per share today.

Fletcher Forests was down 1c at 98, Ports of Tauranga lost 4c to 425, and Vending Technologies was down 4c at 101.

There were 54 rises and 27 falls on the 132 stocks traded.

The Dow Jones industrial average finished up 77.59 points, or 0.91 per cent, to 8594.02. The technology-laced Nasdaq Composite Index gained 17.68 points, or 1.19 per cent, to 1507.55.

- NZPA