Market commentaries

WELLINGTON: New Zealand shares rose as a strong rally in Australia helped overcome the subdued tone set over the weekend, and as investors were heartened by news that no new local Covid19 infections had been reported in the past 24 hours.

The S&P/NZX 50 Index increased 26.97 points, or 0.3%, to 10,475.98. Within the index, 16 stocks rose, 31 fell, and three were unchanged. Turnover was $123.7 million.

A gloomy lead from Wall Street on Friday prompted the local market to fall as much as 1.5% in morning trading, with investors fretting over the prospect of the US and China resuming their trade war.

That sombre tone hung over most of Asia, with most major markets down in afternoon trading. Australia was one of the few to buck the trend, with the S&P/ASX 200 Index up 1.5% in afternoon trading.

The local market started its rally following the announcement of the first day without new Covid19 infections since the country went into lockdown.

‘‘This morning we would’ve been trading on the Friday night trading from the US which was quite negative, but the Aussie market is bucking that trend today,’’ Hamilton Hindin Greene investment adviser Grant Davies said yesterday.

Australian fintech Afterpay led the Australian market higher in late trading, up 24.3% at $A36.255 after it said Chinese gaming and social media giant

Tencent had built up a 5% stake.

Mobile payments app developer Pushpay Holdings rose 2.4% to $4.30.

A2 Milk Co led the local market higher, up 4% at $19.97. Fonterra Shareholders’ Fund units increased 0.5% to $3.70, and Synlait Milk slipped 0.4% to $6.83.

Blue chip companies drove the day’s gain: Mercury NZ rose 1.8% to $4.50, Goodman Property Trust was up 1.8% at $2.26, Spark New Zealand increased 1.6% to $4.42, Ryman Healthcare was up 1.6% at $12.12, and Meridian Energy rose 1.2% to $4.39.

Duallisted Westpac Banking Corp increased 0.7% to $16.88 after reporting a 62% drop in firsthalf net profit to $A1.19 billion ($NZ1.26 billion), meeting expectations. Mr Davies said investors had been expecting a negative update.

Australia & New Zealand Banking Group fell 0.2% to $17.10.

The majority of stocks in the benchmark index were weaker yesterday, led by firms with the most immediate exposure to an economic downturn.

SkyCity Entertainment Group posted the day’s biggest decline, down 3.9% at $2.45. Kathmandu Holdings declined 3.9% to 75 cents and Oceania

Healthcare fell 2.7% to 73 cents. Air New Zealand decreased 1.2% to $1.27.

Courier company Freightways declined 1.5% to $6.60; Mainfreight fell 0.5% to $36.31.

Outside the benchmark index, NZME dropped 2.3% to 21 cents.

The Australian sharemarket reversed its early losses of as much as 1.4% to finish higher by a similar amount.

After being down 76.3 points early the S&P/ ASX200 benchmark index closed Monday up 73.9, or 1.41%, at 5,319.8 points, while the All Ordinaries index finished 64.5 points higher, or 1.21%, at 5,389.5 points.

One Australian dollar was buying 63.83 US cents. — BusinessDesk/AAP