New Zealand’s market wasn’t surprised by the Reserve Bank of NZ (RBNZ) lifting the official cash rate by 50 basis points to 2.5% – but the dollar still dropped slightly following the announcement.

The NZ dollar fell against the US dollar after the RBNZ said this afternoon that it remained appropriate to continue the tightening policy, dropping from 61.34 US cents to 61.12 cents. 

The kiwi then ended the day trading at 61.29 US cents, with the trade-weighted index at 70.24, from 70.12 yesterday.

Hobson Wealth director Brad Gordon said the RBNZ’s decision hadn’t surprised the market as it had been bracing itself for the 50bp hike and had carried on accordingly after it was obvious there was no unexpected surprise in store.

The S&P/NZX 50 Index rose 6.9 points or 0.06% to 11,110.14. Turnover was $111.6 million.

On the market’s front, Spark shares rose again today, up 1.4% to $5.06.

The telecommunications company's shares are still riding yesterday’s news that it had secured its future expansion after it sold 70% of TowerCo for $900m to the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board.

The impending sale implies a total company value of $1.17 billion, which Spark said is 33.8 times expected earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the June 2023 financial year.

Gordon said the sale was very much above market expectations.

“Obviously the market will be expecting some capital returns as well – whether that's buyback or straight capital return will be a big question, but it was a good sale price,” he said.

MYOB

ANZ Banking Group confirmed it is in talks with an American global investment company about a potential acquisition of bookkeeping software firm MYOB.

ANZ Bank responded to “market speculation” today and told the NZX that it was in discussion with US alternative asset firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) about buying the KKR-owned MYOB.

KKR bought MYOB in 2019 for A$2b after first launching its bid for the company in late 2018.

Gordon said ANZ’s interest in MYOB was an “interesting move” for the bank.

“They'd be picking up a pretty intricate part of the market,” he said. “It'd be interesting to understand what the motivation behind it is.”

ANZ Bank shares were up 0.4% to $24.95 at the end of the day.

Westpac Bank's shares were also up 0.77% to $22.35, but Heartland Group was down 0.51% to $1.96. 

Kathmandu Holdings rose 0.9% to $1.11 after it told the NZX that it expected its total sales for the year to July 31, 2022, to be in the range of $955m to $965m – up from the $922.8m it reported in its full-year financials to July 31 last year. 

Sky Network Television was down 2.9% to $2.32 after it was revealed that due to chipset shortages and global supply chain challenges, there would be a “short” delay in delivering the first of its new Sky Boxes to customers' homes.

Chief executive Sophie Moloney said she was pleased to confirm that “notwithstanding these challenges” the technical trials of the new Sky Box were already underway.

The boxes were previously planned to be released from the middle of the year to the spring of 2022.

Fleet company Eroad was up 2.4% to $2.14 and Air NZ was also up 2.5% to $62.5 cents.