The worry about rising inflation and interest rates reared its head again and drove the New Zealand sharemarket down more than 1 per cent.<\/p>\n
The S&P\/NZX 50 Index fell 134.75 points or 1.09 per cent<\/span> to 12,224.50 following another increase in US 10-Year Treasury bonds. There were 41 gainers and 91 decliners over the whole market on steady volume of 46.72 million share transactions worth $187.74 million.<\/span><\/p>\n The US Treasury yield reached a high of 1.61 per cent last week but moved back to 1.41 per cent before climbing to 1.47 per cent overnight. The New Zealand 10-Year Government bond yield has moved from a low of 0.4 per cent to 1.85 per cent.<\/p>\n Sam Dickie, senior portfolio manager with Fisher Funds, said the latest rise in US interest rates and the worry about “nascent inflation” flowed into the local market.<\/p>\n “It was left to the re-opening stocks to keep bubbling away, while the Covid beneficiaries such as Fisher and Paykel Healthcare and interest rate sensitive companies like Meridian dragged the market down.<\/p>\n “Overseas markets are also taking a breather. You’ve seen the US going up every day in a steady, non-volatile fashion, but the S&P 500 Index has fallen 2.5 per cent in the last two days,” Dickie said.<\/p>\n The Australian S&P\/ASX 200 Index was down 1.24 per cent to 6733.30 points at 5.45pm (NZ time), and the technology-drive Nasdaq Composite in the US fell 2.7 per cent to 12,997.75.<\/p>\n The local market is looking forward to Friday’s listing of My Food Bag<\/strong>, the well-known meal kit company. My Food Bag raised $342m through a placement of 185m shares at $1.85 a share.<\/p>\n “I hope it goes well,” said Dickie. “We don’t get many of these exciting initial public offerings nowadays.”<\/p>\n Market leaders Fisher and Paykel Healthcare<\/strong> fell 84c or 2.91 per cent to $28, and Meridian Energy<\/strong> was down 21.5c or 3.65 per cent to $5.675.<\/p>\n Fellow energy stock Mercury<\/strong> lost 16c or 2.54 per cent to $6.14; Tilt Renewables<\/strong> was down 13c or 2.02 per cent to $6.31; Auckland International Airport<\/strong> declined 29c or 3.96 per cent to $7.03; and Ebos Group<\/strong> shed 27.5c to $28 after reaching an intraday day high of $28.79.<\/p>\n Wine exporter Delegat Group<\/strong> fell 25c to $14.75; and apple exporter Scales Corporation<\/strong> decreased 15c or 3.26 per cent to $4.45.<\/p>\n Synlait Milk<\/strong> plunged 39c or 10.13 per cent to a low of $3.46 after announcing that its 2021 net profit will be less than a half of the previous year’s $75.2m. Synlait’s share price has been on a slide since early November when it sat at $5.93. Its two-year high was $11.20 on March 18, 2019, and it fell to $4.40 on March 19 last year when Covid-19 struck.<\/p>\n Synlait has been hampered lately by the goings-on of its major customer and shareholder a2 Milk<\/strong>, which fell 9c to $10.01. Synlait told the market there’s an ongoing uncertainty about a2 Milk’s demand for the remainder of 2021 and the 2022 financial years as it rebalances inventory levels, resulting in a significant drop in its infant formula production.<\/p>\n Re-opening stocks \u2013 those battered by the Covid pandemic \u2013 continue to recover, with Sky City Entertainment<\/strong>, which fell to $2.87 on February 22, rising 8c or 2.56 per cent to $3.21.<\/p>\n