The New Zealand sharemarket ended slightly firmer today as it braced for earnings reports from Telecom, Contact Energy and Sky Television tomorrow.Mainfreight rose 19c to 670 after reporting first quarter sales up 20.5% compared with a year earlier and eb
The New Zealand sharemarket ended slightly firmer today as it braced for earnings reports from Telecom, Contact Energy and Sky Television tomorrow.
Mainfreight rose 19c to 670 after reporting first quarter sales up 20.5% compared with a year earlier and ebitda up 32.4%, saying business performance in the countries where it was based had improved on the trading trend of the previous six months.
Shares in Freightways continued a run higher, rising 5c to 292 today, after the company reported on Monday that its second half performance was better than the first six months.
Overall, the benchmark NZX-50 index closed up 11.604 points, or 0.4%, at 3029.786 after initially opening slightly lower.
James Lee, head of institutional equities at First NZ Capital, said the market has a big day tomorrow with three of the top 10 companies reporting.
"Once we are through that we will have most of the core New Zealand profit reports," he said.
So far the season had been below expectations and profit guidance had been muted.
"We haven't really had any decent beats except for Mainfreight," he said.
Contact Energy rose 4c to 582, Telecom rose 2c to 210 and Sky TV was unchanged at 492.
NZ Farming Systems Uruguay rose 1c to 64, which is above the price of competing bids for the company.
Affco was unchanged at 38 on a day Talleys extended its offer for the company.
Fletcher Building gained 9c to 743, building on yesterday's 16c gain which came after the company relieved some investors of their worst fears by reporting an annual result in line with expectations.
Fisher&Paykel Healthcare dropped 3c to 280, Sanford fell 5c to 397, Pike River Coal fell 1c to 95. The Warehouse fell 1c to 347.
Goodman Fielder fell 1c to 157 on the day it reported earnings. Ebos fell 5c to 655 and Infratil fell 1c to 160.
