Wellington, Oct 14 NZPA - The New Zealand sharemarket raced up in early trading, after global stocks bounced off five-year lows as they surged to record single-day gains.

Strong rises in equities around the world came after governments in Europe took bold steps to quell the global financial crisis and avert a deep recession.

In this country, the benchmark NZSX-50 index was up 190.71 points, or 6.9 percent, to 2973.1 by 10.20am. Yesterday it lost 22.9 points, or 0.8 percent, and has fallen for the past seven sessions, from above 3230 points early this month.

Among the leading stocks today, Telecom was up 20c early to 268, Contact Energy lifted 41c to 746, and Fletcher Building was up 65c to 650.

Dual-listed Australian banks showed the largest increases with ANZ Banking Group adding 270 to 2100 and Westpac up 160 to 2560.

Other big risers included AMP up 71c to 751, Mainfreight 35c to 545, New Zealand Refining Co 30c to 630, Sanford 30c to 535, Nuplex 28c to 533 and Trustpower 26c to 730.

Among the largest gainers in percentage terms were Pike River Coal, up 14.9 percent or 20c to 154, Guinness Peat Group 13.1 percent or 13c to 112, Ryman Healthcare 12.1 percent or 17c to 157 and Fisher & Paykel Appliances 10.3 percent or 14c to 150.

US stocks posted their largest one-day percentage rise ever. The Dow Jones industrial average closed up 11.1 percent at 9387.61. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index surged 11.6 percent at 1003.35. The Nasdaq Composite Index advanced 11.8 percent, at 1844.25.

The FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares closed 10.1 percent higher at 937.41.

Asian stocks jumped more than 7 percent, according to MSCI's index of Asia-Pacific stocks outside Japan, where markets were closed for a holiday.

Australian shares ended up 5.6 percent yesterday, the biggest one-day percentage gain since October 1997, buoyed by the government's blanket guarantee to all bank deposits that sparked a turnaround in financial stocks.

NZPA WGT Reuters mjd nb