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Westpac Banking Corp’s New Zealand unit lifted first-quarter earnings 9.7 percent as it widened its interest rate margins, although its bottom line was eroded by unrealised changes in the value of its financial instruments. Profit after tax and before fair value movements climbed to $159 million in the three months ended Dec. 31 from $145 million a year earlier, according …

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index retreated from a five-year high as disappointing US housing numbers failed to offer confidence. In afternoon trading in New York, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.06 percent, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index fell 0.42 percent, while the Nasdaq Composite Index shed 0.55 percent. The S&P 500 yesterday closed at 1,530.94 the highest …

RBNZ Governor Graeme Wheeler yesterday laid out some home truths for markets. The NZD is not a one way bet. And markets looking for rate hikes in 2013 may be a step too far – unless the currency tanks that is. We come in this morning with the NZD/USD down a cent and the 2yr swap rate 6bps lower from …

New Zealand shares fell, led by Fletcher Building after the biggest company on the NZX 50 Index posted first-half earnings highlighting tough times in Australia. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare jumped after unexpectedly lifting its guidance. The NZX 50 fell 29.97 points, or 0.7 percent, to 4214.24. Within the index, 25 stocks fell, 16 rose and nine were unchanged. Turnover was …

The New Zealand dollar shed more than half a US cent after Reserve Bank governor Graeme Wheeler outlined the central bank’s criteria to intervene in currency markets, and said he was prepared to act when those were met. The kiwi fell to 84.04 US cents at 5pm in Wellington from 84.61 cents immediately before Wheeler’s speech and down from 84.37 …

Reserve Bank governor Graeme Wheeler has told manufacturers he will intervene in currency markets if the circumstances will let him smooth the peaks and troughs, though he can’t set the level of the currency. The kiwi dropped half a US cent after the speech’s release. In a speech entitled, ‘manufacturing decline not just a dollar story’, Wheeler told the New …

Receivers for the collapsed Mainzeal Property and Construction say they hope to see work resume or responsibility returned to clients “in the near future” on the numerous projects that stopped in their tracks three weeks ago, when the receivership was announced. The second largest construction firm in the country, Mainzeal announced its receivership on Waitangi Day, Feb 6. The collapse …

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, which makes breathing masks and respirators, lifted its full-year guidance a second time as demand for new breathing masks helps speed sales and margins widen. The shares jumped 6.8 percent on the news. Net profit would rise be about $75 million in the year ending March 31, up 17 percent from a year earlier, the Auckland-based …

Fletcher Building chief executive Mark Adamson, in the job for just four months, has embarked on a review of the company’s business model aiming to find $70 million a year in additional earnings from centralising operations. Adamson got approval from his board yesterday for the plan that is likely to see hundreds of jobs cut across Australia and New Zealand. …

New Zealand producers’ input and output prices both fell in the fourth quarter, with falling prices for electricity cited as the biggest contributor. Producers’ output prices fell 0.1 percent in the final three months of 2012, to be 0.8 percent lower than in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to Statistics New Zealand. Input prices fell 0.3 percent and were …