The New Zealand sharemarket climbed to its highest level in eight weeks after delivering its third successive day of gains, with property stocks rebounding.

The S&P/NZX 50 Index finished the session strongly from mid-afternoon and
closed at 11,996.71, rising 116.17 points or 0.98 per cent after reaching an intraday low of 11,846.33.

The index has risen 3.77 per cent over the last three trading days and is now up nearly 2 per cent for the year.

There were 68 gainers and 65 decliners over the whole market with 38.43 million shares worth $149.77 million changing hands.

Matt Goodson, managing director of Salt Funds Management, said the local market was relatively buoyant across most of the large cap stocks as money gets put to work.

“Bond yields declined on weak jobs data in the United States and this filtered through to Australia and New Zealand, with property stocks bouncing after having a torrid May,” Goodson said.

US job vacancies fell to 8.06 million in April, down 296,000 on the previous month and the lowest since February 2021. It was below the estimate of 8.4 million vacancies and showed the economy is starting to weaken. The market is now pricing in a 60 per cent likelihood of two interest rate cuts this year.

Australia’s economy posted a modest 0.1 per cent of growth over the first three months of the calendar year, coming in a little weaker than the 0.2 per cent expected lift.

On an annual basis, gross domestic product increased 1.1 per cent, the lowest since the 12 months ending December 2020.

The European Central Bank is expected to be the first to cut rates, 24 basis points to 3.67 per cent, with an announcement Friday morning (NZ time).

On Wall Street, AI darling Nvidia and the world’s biggest retailer Walmart hit new highs after rising 1.25 per cent to US$1164.37 and 1.19 per cent to US$66.60 respectively.

There was good news on the home front with the Global Dairy Trade index rising 1.7 per cent at the latest auction, with prices for skim milk powder increasing 3 per cent and whole milk 1.7 per cent.

On the NZX index, the property sector was up 1.5 per cent. Argosy increased 3c or 2.86 per cent to $1.08; Property for Industry rose 5c or 2.38 per cent to $2.15; Vital Healthcare Trust was up 4.4c or 2.41 per cent to $1.898; and Goodman Trust added 4c or 1.86 per cent to $2.19.

Precinct Properties gained 0.005c to $1.17 after announcing two new Auckland building projects at its Investor Day. Precinct has bought 265 Queen St for $9m and will build up to 500 studio units, starting during the second quarter of next year, in a purpose-built student accommodation development.

It has a conditional agreement to buy a 5250sq m site linking Dominion Rd and Valley Rd in Mt Eden for $13.25m and develop high-density apartments in conjunction with Eke Panuku Development, starting in the middle of next year.

Fletcher Building was down 11c or 3.49 per cent to a 21-year low of $3.04 after having its credit rating of Baa2 reduced to Baa3 on a negative outlook by Moody’s Ratings. Fletcher said the amended rating does not have a material impact on the company’s cost of funding in the near term.

Fisher and Paykel Healthcare gained $1.15 or 3.82 per cent to a new two-year high of $31.25; Auckland International Airport increased 29c or 3.83 per cent to $7.87; Spark recovered 5c to $4.10; Skellerup was up 9c or 2.43 per cent to $3.79; and Infratil added 23c or 2.12 per cent to $11.07 after going ex-dividend.

In the energy sector, Mercury Energy increased 17c or 2.57 per cent to $6.78; Contact was up 10c to $9.18; Manawa gained 8c or 1.87 per cent to $4.35; Vector added 6c to $3.79; and Meridian was down 7c to $6.48.

Ebos Group declined 29c to $33.71; Mainfreight shed $1.47 or 2.1 per cent to $68.37; Summerset Group fell a further 30c or 3.05 per cent to $9.55; Oceania Healthcare was down 2c or 3.64 per cent to 53c; and Seeka decreased 11c or 4.17 per cent to $2.53.

SkyCity was down 4c or 2.26 per cent to $1.73; Tourism Holdings eased 4c or 2.09 per cent to $1.87; T&G Global declined 5c or 2.86 per cent to $1.70; Foley Wines decreased 2c or 2.22 per cent to 88c; and Millennium & Copthorne Hotels NZ fell 10c or 5.18 per cent to $1.83.

Burger Fuel, up 0.01c to 35c, has returned $4.077m capital to shareholders, and 30 per cent of the shares held by each shareholder have been cancelled.