Fast forward six months and this year's slump in power company share prices means not a single "gentailer" has made the top 10 list for the first half.
Interestingly, Nuplex Industries - whose share price performance hasn't been that crash hot in recent years - has surged to the top of the winners' table with a 38.3 per cent gain.
The specialty chemicals and resins maker, whose shares closed down 1.46 per cent at $4.06 last night, revealed in February that it had more than tripled half-year profit to $37.3 million from $11.4 million in the same period a year earlier. Nuplex is also planning a share buy-back of as much as 5 per cent of its stock on issue.
SkyCity Entertainment just managed to scrape into the list, in 10th place, with a 10.3 per cent gain.
Also on the up - Retirement village operator Summerset Group is the second-best performer, up 36.5 per cent.
The Auckland-based company said on Tuesday that full-year underlying profit would increase by up to 39 per cent to as much as $34 million.
That prompted brokerage Forsyth Barr to lift its recommendation on the stock, which closed down 0.26 per cent at $3.77 last night, from neutral to outperform.
Meanwhile, Coats Group - formerly Guinness Peat Group - is in fourth place, behind Z Energy.
Coats shares are up 27.8 per cent, while shareholders in Z have enjoyed a 28 per cent gain.
The fuel retailer's stock surged last month after it announced plans to acquire Caltex operator Chevron NZ in a deal that would give Z a whopping 49 per cent market share.
Finally, Restaurant Brands' spot in eighth place, up 16 per cent, is a good reminder that while fried chicken, pizzas and burgers might shorten your lifespan, they're a pretty good bet for investors.
The company - which operates KFC, Pizza Hut, Carl's Jr and Starbucks - posted a 19 per cent lift in full-year profit to $23.8 million in April. Restaurant Brands shares, which have gained about 130 per cent since March 2012, closed down 2.58 per cent at $4.15 last night.
Going down
Now for some of the laggers.
New Zealand Oil & Gas has been the worst performer of the NZX 50 so far this year, down 28.9 per cent.
In February the company reported a half-year net loss of $10.5 million after its Tui oilfield asset was written down by $13 million as a result of plunging oil prices. The loss compared with a $4 million profit in same period a year earlier.
Kathmandu has also taken a big drop (down 24.5 per cent), and the share price gains that followed Briscoe Group's takeover plans, announced last week, haven't lifted the outdoor apparel retailer out of the 10 worst performers list.
Genesis, Contact and the Fonterra Shareholders' Fund have also had a tough start to the year.
Good call, Brian
Brian Henry might have had a point when he suggested, a couple of months back, that shares in British technology firm Arria NLG were a good buy.
At that time, the London-listed stock had plunged by more than 70 per cent after the company announced the stalling of fundraising talks following the loss of its biggest customer, oil giant Shell.
The stock closed as low as 4p on May 29. But Arria shares have staged quite a comeback since then, gaining more than 400 per cent to close at 21.5p yesterday.
The stock was given a helping hand by the June 29 announcement that the company had secured 3.75 million ($8.57 million) in funding through a convertible loan arrangement being managed by New Zealand's MSL Capital Partners.
The Wellington-based firm was lead manager of two private capital raisings that preceded Arria's December 2013 stock exchange listing.
A number of high-profile New Zealanders, including economist Gareth Morgan and former Telecom chief executive Theresa Gattung, participated in those funding rounds.
Henry, the founder of NZX-listed Diligent Board Member Services, played a key role in establishing Arria, whose artificial intelligence software, developed at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, sifts through data to generate reports usually produced by analysts.
