Pushpay shares surge as new investor buys cornerstone

The S&P/NZX 50 Index rose 65.25 points, or 0.5%, to 12,394.34. Within the index, 27 stocks fell, 19 rose and four unchanged. Turnover was $442.2 million, the bulk of which came from the Pushpay trade.

Investors waved goodbye to early Pushpay backers, Peter and Christopher Huljich after they sold their holding to US-based investment firm Sixth Street Partners for $320m, at $1.85 per share.

The price was 4% higher than Pushpay’s 30-day volume-weighted average price, at $1.78, and was a 2% premium to trading on Monday.

Almost 180 million shares changed hands as the 173m share trade was processed through the market today. Shares surged 10.2% to $1.95 as some investors were encouraged by the new cornerstone investor paying above market price.

Shares in Kathmandu Holdings also spiked, up 8.9% at $1.35, after the adventure retailer resumed paying dividends on the back of strong sales from its Rip Curl brand.

The company said underlying earnings for the half-year were $48.2m and that it would pay an interim dividend of 2 cents a share in June.

Scales Corporation climbed 1.3% to $4.61 after the agriculture firm said it was looking at buying Villa Maria Estates winery.

The company had a $97.6m war chest at the end of 2020 but may need to raise capital to fund its bid for the winemaker, which is rumoured to be north of A$200m.

Elsewhere in private investment, venture capital firm Movac led a $10m funding round for Tradify, a job management software for tradies.

Oceania Healthcare was put in a trading halt at $1.39 after it announced it will raise up to $100m, at $1.30 per share, to fund the purchase of an existing village and more land to construct a new one.

Housing policy spikes dollar 

New government housing policy announced this morning sent the NZ dollar tumbling to a three-month low. Under the new rules, property investors would no longer be able to deduct mortgage interest payments from rental income to reduce tax.

Tim Kelleher, head of foreign exchange at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, said a number of economists had said the rules would be a “major headwind for the economy” spooking traders.

“We’ve definitely seen some kiwi weakness off the back of it,” he told BusinessDesk.

The kiwi dollar was trading at 70.94 US cents at 5pm in Wellington, down from 71.58 cents yesterday, after tracking steadily lower ever since the announcement.

The trade-weighted index was at 74.12 at 5pm, from 74.76 yesterday. The kiwi traded at 91.97 Australian cents unchanged from yesterday, was at 77.14 yen from 77.84 yen, 59.46 euro cents from 60.15 cents, 51.23 British pence from 51.66 pence, and 4.6180 Chinese yuan from 4.6538 yuan.