Market commentary

WELLINGTON: The New Zealand sharemarket got back on an even keel by making solid gains yesterday, but it ran out of puff towards the finish line.

The S&P/NZX 50 Index was up as much as 1%, erasing half the loss of the day before, but the index closed at 13,127.29, a rise of 40.82 points, or 0.31%. The intraday high was 13,279.96, and overall the index was down 1.5% in a fascinating week.

Trading picked up later in the day, 50.2 million shares worth $174.88 million changing hands, and there were 82 gainers and 55 decliners.

Salt Funds Management managing director Matt Goodson said ‘‘we had a little bit of a bounce but it certainly faded as the day progressed — just as the Australian market did’’.

‘‘We’ve had quite extraordinary volatility out of the US in the last few days involving the heavilyshorted stocks like GameStop and the hedge funds having to cover their positions. I’ve never seen so much uncertainty as to what will happen next — but the speculative excess occurs when you can get money so cheaply.’’

Locally, many of the leading stocks had a recovery day. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was up 14c to $34.64; Chorus climbed 17c, or 2.06%, to $8.43; a2 Milk rose 21c, or 1.85%, to $11.54; Ebos Group gained 22c to $28.62; Skellerup Holdings was up 14c, or 3.73%, to $3.89; and Freightways increased 10c to $11.

The ‘‘volatile’’ energy stocks had a mixed day. Mercury was up 1.5c to $7.125; Genesis increased 7.5c, or 1.95%, to $3.92; Vector rose 7c to $4.30; and Tilt Renewables was up 13c to $6.28. Contact was down 18c, or 2.16%, to $8.17 and Meridian slipped 6c to $7.15. Utilities investor Infratil fell 46c, or 6.01%, to $7.20.

With no new Covid19 community cases here, Auckland International Airport rose 28c, or 3.9%, to $7.45, and Air New Zealand was unchanged at $1.59.

Oceania Healthcare increased 4c, or 2.6%, to a new high of $1.58, while fellow retirement village operator Ryman Healthcare fell 24c to $15.56.

Two of the biggest movers were Pushpay — up 7c, or 4.43%, to $1.65 — and cinema software firm Vista Group, which rose 6c, or 4.2%, to $1.49. Electronics manufacturer Rakon was down 3c or 4.17% to 69c.

Restaurant Brands rose 22c, or 1.91%, to $11.75 after reporting a 2.1% increase in total sales for the year ending December. —