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NZX’s full year 2015 operating metrics released today highlight the continued resilience of New Zealand’s capital markets in 2015 and the progression of a range of market development activities to broaden and deepen our capital markets.
While IPO activity was down on the record levels of 2014, significant amounts of secondary capital were raised; the debt market grew substantially; trading activity was well up on the prior year; and the benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index increased 13.6% during the year. Conversely, adverse conditions in the rural sector negatively impacted advertising volumes in NZX’s rural publications and the volume of grain traded on the Clear Grain Exchange.
There were four IPOs on the Main Board in 2015 (Fliway Group, CBL Insurance, Senior Trust Retirement Village Listed Fund and AFT Pharmaceuticals) and one NXT market listing (G3 Group). In addition, Mercantile Investment Company undertook a compliance listing and Pushpay Holdings and Snakk Media migrated from the NZAX to the Main Board and NXT market respectively.
There was 12.0% growth in trading volumes over the year, and value traded was up 19.1% compared to 2014. Secondary listing activity was extremely strong with an additional $12.9 billion of capital raised by all issuers, up 435.9% on 2014. This was largely driven by significant capital raising activity by dual-listed Australian banks.
It was an exceptional year for debt listings. New debt issues were up 374.3% with $8.11 billion listed, including the listing by the Local Government Funding Agency (LGFA) of all six existing series of its bonds, representing a total principal amount of $5.56 billion. In 2015, NZX’s Debt Market capitalisation increased by 50.3% to $19.8 billion.
NZX acquired leading New Zealand superannuation and passive funds manager SuperLife in January 2015. SuperLife achieved good growth in funds under management over the year, which were up 16.8% overall including 31.1% growth in its KiwiSaver business. The acquisition of SuperLife enabled the launch of 16 new Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) during the year, bringing the total number of ETFs offered by Smartshares to 23. The new ETFs give investors the opportunity to invest across all the main assets classes, being cash, bonds, shares and property.
NZX’s Derivatives business continued to demonstrate stellar growth with lots traded up 111.5% on 2014 to 213,627.
NZX Regulation Metrics
NZX also released its annual 2015 regulation metrics today. They show NZX Regulation commenced 135 investigations of issuers during the year compared to 107 in 2014. In addition, 71 investigations were commenced in relation to participants during 2015, unchanged from 2014. Other key regulation statistics are included in the full metrics documents.
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