Trade light, but week ends on positive note

Rebecca Howard

Apositive Friday helped New Zealand shares gain 0.9 per cent over the course of the week. The S&P/NZX 50 Index closed yesterday at 11,858.31, up 55.29 points or 0.47 per cent for the day.

There were 69 gainers and 61 decliners over the whole market with 17.25 million share transactions worth $49.5 million.

“There’s not a lot of movement anywhere, with markets just coasting into the end of the week,” said Grant Davies, investment adviser with Hamilton Hindin Greene.

Volumes were light, but “maybe as more people return from their holidays next week, we must start to see a bit more volume and maybe some direction,” he said.

Wall Street was largely flat after the latest US inflation data came in stronger than expected, shedding doubt on a possible March rate cut by the US Federal Reserve.

The S&P 500 ended down 0.07 per cent at 4,780.24 while the Nasdaq Composite was flat at 14,970.18. The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 0.04 per cent to 37,711.02.

US headline December CPI rose by 0.3 per cent month-on-month, 0.1 per cent higher than expected and up 3.4 per cent year-on-year.

The Federal Reserve’s federal open market committee will meet at the end of this month and minutes of its December meeting indicated cuts were likely this year, although the path was uncertain.

According to ANZ Bank, the market is still pricing in a 64 per cent chance of a March rate cut by the Federal Reserve.

However, “the market is well ahead of itself, pricing a high likelihood of a Fed cut by March”, it said.

Across the Tasman, the S&P/ASX 200 Index was down 0.1 per cent at 7,494.30 at 5pm NZ time.

In this country, Summerset was once again one of the strongest performers, gaining 1.2 per cent to $11.18 after it reported record sales in the December quarter this week.

Ryman Healthcare, meanwhile, shed 0.9 per cent to $5.83 and was the second most traded stock on the day with 1,595,375 shares changing hands.

It was outstripped by Geo, which fell 8.33 per cent to 1.1c with 4,482,533 shares trading hands.

This week the company said it would hold a shareholder meeting on January 23 and seek approval to remove itself from the NZX.

Retailers were mixed as KMD Brands fell 1.33 per cent to 74c, Briscoe Group was unchanged at $4.65, Warehouse Group added 2.55 per cent to $1.61, Michael Hill International was unchanged at 96c and Hallenstein Glasson added 1.1 per cent to $5.49.