NZ stocks: Media story continues to brighten market

12.00 pm

The New Zealand sharemarket got off to a typically quiet Monday start this morning, but offshore markets and healthy media stocks raised hopes for a positive session.

During the weekend Wall St stocks rallied on strong economic data and the Dow Jones rose 2.6 per cent -- its strongest level since August last year.

Just after 11am the NZSE capital index was up 4.50 points to 2086.77 on a turnover of $23.9 million.

"The market is looking for some leads later this morning, but the overseas markets did very well over the weekend and the New Zealand market doesn't really get started until the Australian market starts up," said Nigel Scott of ABN Amro.

Leading the market was Telecom, up 3c to 508 on $8.2 million worth of shares.

Features of the session so far were Sky TV and its majority owner Independent Newspapers Ltd, which continued to build on a share price spike last week.

On Friday Sky TV had soared to a near two-year high of 455 and this morning it was up another 4c to 459. Brokers said on Friday that the pay TV operation seemed to be sailing on from a strong result two weeks ago.

Although Sky TV announced a net half-year loss of $13.19 million, the result was not as bad as the market had expected, and INL had posted a 94 per cent rise in first-half profit to $27.1 million. This morning INL was up 1c to 416.

Another stock headed skywards, Sky City, powered up 15c to 605. Other improvers were Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, up 10c to 1070; Hallenstein Glasson, up 6c to 287; Ports of Auckland, up 11c to 605; and Auckland Airport, up 1c to 411.

Those on the downside this morning included Contact Energy, down 2c to 398; the Warehouse, down 5c to 655; Carter Holt Harvey, down 3c to 194, and Steel and Tube, down 10c to 275.

Air NZ was steady at 35 amid threats of legal action from Ansett workers and continued investigation by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission over Ansett's collapse.

So far there have been 37 rises and 20 falls on 100 stocks traded.

On Wall St, the blue-chip Dow Jones industrial average hit a six-month high after upbeat data on manufacturing, construction and consumer spending raised hopes the economy and corporate profits will rebound soon.

The Dow surged 262.73 points, or 2.6 per cent, to 10,368.86, while the broader Standard & Poor's 500 Index rose 25.05 points, or 2.26 per cent, to 1131.78.

The technology-laced Nasdaq Composite Index pulled in a gain of 71.26 points, or 4.12 per cent, to 1802.75.

"It's an extremely powerful and meaningful rally, based on the economic data, which negate the thought the economy is in recession. That's what the market wants to hear," said Peter Cardillo, chief strategist at Global Partners.

- NZPA