MARKET CLOSE: NZ stocks rise; Pumpkin Patch leads gainers

MARKET CLOSE: NZ stocks rise; Pumpkin Patch leads gainers, Pyne Gould falls

By Jason Krupp

Feb. 1 (BusinessDesk) - New Zealand stocks rose for the first time in three sessions, with Pumpkin Patch Ltd. leading gainers on the exchange while Pyne Gould Corp. fell.

The NZX 50 Index rose 9.72 points, or 0.3%, to 3348.46. Within the index, 24 stocks rose, 16 fell, and 10 were unchanged. Turnover was $80.1 million.

Pumpkin Patch, the children's clothing retailer, rose 3.5% to $1.47, recovering some of the ground lost when shares plunged to their lowest level since 2009 after the company last week said full-year earnings may fall by as much as 37% due to weaker sales.

Net profit is now expected to come in at between $16 million and $18 million for the 12 months to July 31, down from last year’s earnings of $25.5 million.

"We think Pumpkin Patch is overtly cheap, in which case you would anticipate shares will get a decent bounce back once the cycle turns," said Peter Sigley, an institutional broker at Goldman Sachs & Partners.

New Zealand Oil & Gas Ltd., the energy exploration and production company, rose 2.4% to 87 cents, after crude oil prices broke through the US$100 a barrel mark for the first time in 28-months on fears Egypt's political unrest could spread to other oil-producing countries in the Middle East.

Fletcher Building Ltd., the country's biggest construction company, rose 0.7% to $7.78, a day after it reached an agreement with Australia's Crane Group on a revised takeover offer for the Australian pipe maker.

The new offer is now valued at A$10.072 per Crane share, consisting of one Fletcher share, A$3.50 in cash, and an A$0.50 fully franked special dividend, compared to the previous cash and scrip offer of A$9.35.

Bathurst Resources Ltd., the coal miner, was unchanged at $1.30 after it said its Buller coal project is on track produce high-quality coking coal at an annual equivalent rate of 650,000 tonnes by the end of this calendar year.

Shares in the newly merged entity Building Society Holdings closed their first day of trading at the indicated listing price of 88 cents, having touched a high of 95 cents and a low of 85 cents during the day.

Shareholders in Canterbury Building Society and Southern Cross Building Society have 13.04% and 14.75% of the new securities respectively, with the remaining 72.21% held by Pyne Gould Corp subsidiary Marac Financial Services.

"The volatility in price reflects that the market is finding it difficult to value the business at this point because it is still early days and the stock is so tightly held by one shareholder," Sigley said.

Shares in Pyne Gould, the financial services company and parent of Marac, fell 2.8% to a historic low of 35 cents, leading decliners on the NZX 50.

Shares in Telecom Corp., the country's biggest phone company, fell 1.3% to $2.25 after government quashed speculation that it was set to name Telecom and

Vodafone as the winner bidders for the $285 million rural broadband project today. The Ministry of Economic Develop said it would make the official announcement in a "couple of weeks".

Pacific Brands, the Australian clothing maker, was unchanged at $1.34 after company said it had successfully restructured its existing syndicated debt with a new $500 million facility.

Pacific Brands said the new facility's staggered maturity profile improves its liquidity profile, and benefits from competitive pricing and improved commercial terms.

Prices for New Zealand-produced raw materials rose for a fifth straight month to a new record in January, as global food prices continue to climb, according to the ANZ Commodity Price Index.

The index climbed 3.8% to 313.3 last month and has surged by almost a fifth since August last year as the price of 13 locally-produced commodities increased.

(BusinessDesk)

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