The market finished the week at 6,069.15, up 40.78 points from the previous week's close of 6,028.37.
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On Friday's trade, the All Ordinaries finished up 22.55 points or 0.37 per cent.
On Monday, SEEK rose 1.9pc after saying it will invest $157m to take full control of its SEEK Asia business, stake lifts from 86.25pc to 100pc. It will purchase the remaining 13.75pc stake from News Corp. It does not change its FY18 guidance and the deal will be funded with debt. SEK ended the week on $20.80.
On Tuesday, News Corp and Telstra both signed agreements to combine Foxtel and Fox Sports Australia. NWS will have a 65pc shareholding in the new group while TLS will hold a 35pc stake. The deal is expected to wrap up by June and comes two months after the ACCC gave its blessing for the deal to go ahead. Telstra said it would record a one-time $263m gain from the deal but has not changed its FY18 forecasts. TLS and NWS both rose by 2pc following the news, and then ended the week on $3.44 and $21.40 respectively.
On Wednesday, Retail Food Group found traction after two days of persistent selling that saw the stock shed almost 49pc of its value. The besieged fast food franchiser ended the session with a six cent or 5.2pc gain to $1.20. RFG then ended the week on $1.185.
On Thursday, banks led the gains with all four major banks lifting. Commonwealth Bank and National Bank both jumped by 1.3pc. While Suncorp’s NZ subsidiary, Vero has sold its 20pc stake in NZ insurer Tower Ltd for NZ$54 million. Vero had previously attempted to acquire 100pc of Tower but was rejected by NZ regulators. SUN announced it expects to make a NZ$8.5 million gain on the sale.
At the close of weekly trading, the gold price finished at $1,324.00 per ounce, the WTI oil price traded at $61.94 a barrel, and the Australian dollar was worth US $0.78.
In the US on Friday night, the Dow Jones finished up 93.85 points to end the week at 24,895.21.
The Share Price Index (SPI) finished up 57 points at 6,020.00 which should lead to a positive start to today’s trade.
