NZ stocks: Market heads south, influenced by falls offshore

12.45pm

The sharemarket headed south in morning trade, influenced by big falls in the US overnight and led by a drop in bellwether stock Telecom, a broker said.

At 11.30am, the benchmark NZSX-50 index was down 5.65 points at 2762.20, while the NZSX-All capital index fell 2.13 points to 929.15.

Top stock Telecom continued to grind down this morning, falling 1c to 598 on turnover of $16.9 million.

Morning turnover was $35.1m. Among the 127 stocks traded were 33 rises and 35 falls.

Fletcher Building's recent surge came to an end this morning, slipping 5c to 522, after rising 45c in the past two days on the back of a better than expected full year result.

Hamilton Hindin Greene broker Grant Williamson said some Fletcher Building shareholders were indulging in a little profit taking in what was a "pathetic market."

Trade on the New Zealand Exchange had followed a similar course to that on Wall St's Dow Jones index, which was down 123.73 points at 9814.59.

Takeover target DB Breweries was unchanged at 946.

Yesterday six directors and executives said they plan to accept the 950c a share takeover offer by its majority shareholder Asia Pacific Breweries (APB).

APB today said it held 88.51 per cent of DB Breweries' shares.

"The takeover looks to be pretty much a done deal," Mr Williamson told NZPA.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was up 3c at 1347.

At yesterday's annual general meeting in Auckland chief executive Mike Daniell said the firm was looking to achieve first-half revenue growth of 20 per cent in US dollars, generating revenue of between US$72m ($111.31m) to US$74m.

Telstra continued to fall, down 2c at 541, despite the Australian company yesterday posting a record net profit for the June year of A$4.12 billion ($4.54b).

Its New Zealand unit, TelstraClear posted a maiden net profit of $2.7m, up from a $157m loss the previous year.

Other stocks on the move today included: AMP down 9c at 701, Contact Energy down 6c at 587, NZ Refining up 10c at 2160, Toll NZ up 2c at 217, TrustPower up 3c at 465, and Wrightson up 1c at 152.

A combination of bad economic news released in the US overnight sent US stocks to their lowest levels for the year.

The Standard & Poor's 500 fell 12.56 points to 1063.23, and the Nasdaq Composite lost 29.93 points to 1752.49.

- NZPA