NZ stocks: Market down as offshore investors sell

6.00pm

The New Zealand sharemarket fell almost 1 per cent today as large offshore sellers jettisoned their shares.

Yesterday's sharemarket rally on the prospect of decisive action by the United States on Iraq was today replaced by a more uncertain mood.

The benchmark NZ50 gross index fell 16.16 points or 0.85 per cent to 1895.86, while the top-40 index was down 0.72 per cent at 1881.87.

Brett Wilkinson of Direct Broking said the market was "subdued and confused" today.

Casino operator Sky City Entertainment fell 44c to 832 on news of tougher than expected proposals to ban smoking in bars and casinos.

At one point, the company saw its market capitalisation plunge $150 million when its share price dived 71c or 8 per cent, before it recovered, relatively speaking, by the close.

Mr Wilkinson said Sky City would believe that as long as the smoke-free ban was a blanket ban, no one party would be disadvantaged.

"You've got to say to yourself, does the gambler stop smoking or does the smoker stop gambling?

"There were large sellers trying to exit the stock, jumping over each other to try and do volume...."

A more positive note for Sky was its share buy-back and its 21c dividend in two days.

Sky City Leisure, the company's cinema division, closed down 25c at 130.

"That is just the fact that it should be trading at half the price of the Sky notes," Mr Wilkinson said.

"Overall on the market, we did see a continuation of offshore portfolio selling."

Big stocks to fall foul of those sellers were Telecom, down 5c at 421; Fletcher Building, down 7c at 356; and Contact Energy, down 7c at 450.

Among the financial services stocks, AMP rose 8c to 820, ANZ gained 28c to 1868, Axa was up 4c at 230, and Westpac rose 20c to 1475.

"AMP has proven to be a good barometer for world markets over the last week," he said.

Turnover was heavy, with 29.39 million stocks valued at $108.62 million. Six companies had turnover of more than one million stocks, with Telecom leading volume with 11.33 million valued at $47.87 million.

Baycorp Advantage was down 1c at 137, Fisher & Paykel Appliances was down 2c at 953, Powerco shed 1c to 128, Fletcher Forests was down 1c at 100, and Auckland Airport shed 4c to 530.

On the up side, Waste Management was up 3c at 308, F&P Healthcare rose 7c to 930, Sky TV was up 2c at 355, Tourism Holdings rose 1c to 104, and Briscoe Group was up 3c at 228.

Among the smaller stocks, Skellmax rose 2c to 105, Designer Textiles lost 2c to 94, Vending Technologies was down 4c at 56, and Richina was down 2c at 49.

There were 43 falls and 34 rises on the 120 stocks traded.

On Wall St, the blue-chip Dow Jones industrial average closed up 52.31 points, or 0.64 per cent, to 8194.23 and the Nasdaq Composite Index added 8.28 points, or 0.59 per cent, to 1400.55.

In Britain, the benchmark FTSE closed in positive territory for the fourth consecutive session, ending at 3747.3.

- NZPA