NZ Stocks: Sharemarket continues to slide during morning trading

12.00 pm

The New Zealand sharemarket opened lower today amid quiet trading and in line with more poor performances on world sharemarkets overnight.

Most of the major markets - except Wall Street - closed with double and three-figure losses after being battered by more profit warnings from United States companies.

"It was extremely quiet in early trading, following on from yesterday," Geoff Brown at J P Morgan Chase said.

The market tone still looked somewhat soft with most of that influence coming from Telecom but there was nothing company specific, he said. It simply reflected the worldwide telecom scene.

"I would guess today will be much the same as yesterday with a narrow trading range and volumes will probably be reasonably light," he said.

The market continued to slide during the morning and at 11am the NZSE-40 index stood at 2041.99 - down 6.55 points - or 0.32 percent - and down from the opening 2046.52.

The NZSE-SCI capital index was 25.20 points - or 0.46 per cent - lower, at 5434.73 and down from the opening 5449.59.

Turnover at 11am was 13.68 million shares, worth $26.56 million and of the 110 traded, 23 rose but 41 fell.

Market heavyweight Telecom - which has a 23 per cent weighting in the Top 40 index -- was 9c lower 542 on turnover of 2.13 million shares, worth $11.57 million.

Telstra was 5c weaker at 705 on volume of 95,340 shares worth $677,289.

Fisher and Paykel was 5c lower at 1105, on turnover of 137,255 shares worth $1.52 million.

Air NZ's domestic A shares were 3c higher at 122 and the freely held B shares gained 7c to 163 after being pushed to eight week highs and rising strongly for a second day, amid renewed hopes that the carrier would sell its troubled Australian subsidiary Ansett Australia.

Brierley Investments was a cent lower at 64 and power company, Natural Gas Corp lost a cent to 97 on turnover of 319,176 shares.

NGC began to improve yesterday when rain refilled hydro lakes and the market speculated that it might sell some customers to state-owned Meridian Energy.

PDL Holdings shed 50c to 1000. Christchurch's Stewart family will pocket slightly more than $97 million from the sale of their controlling shareholding in PDL to French conglomerate Schneider Electric.

Fletcher Challenge spin-off, Rubicon, was unchanged at 63.

Fletcher Building was a couple of cents lower at 229, Fletcher Forests preference shares were topping turnover - by volume - with 3.16 million shares worth $916,275 and were a cent lower at 30 but the company's main shares rose a cent to 31.

Meat exporter Richmond lost 5c to 240 but on light volume and Auckland International Airport rose a cent to 376.

Lion Nathan was unchanged at 517 and Montana Group rose a cent to 481. The reactivated stock exchange standing committee deciding on Montana Group's ownership might have to take a rain check on its deliberations this week.

The original committee - retired High Court judge Sir Ian Barker, retired Court of Appeal judge Sir Duncan McMullin and Bill Wilson QC - might have to postpone their ruling on Lion Nathan's penalty for defaulter securities until they can find the time to get together.

Pay TV operator Sky TV lost 3c to 335 and part owner, Independent Newspapers rose 10c to 360.

Infratil was a couple of cents higher at 137 and wood-products firm Carter Holt Harvey dropped a cent to 174.

The Warehouse was 2c lighter at 570, Contact Energy lost a cent to 290, Trans Tasman Properties was steady at 23 and Waste Management dropped 4c to 390.

Among other moves, drinks company Frucor shed 6c to 154, casino operator Sky City was at an all time high with a rise of 25c to 1100, financial-services company Tower was unchanged at 518, AMP shed 29c to 2556 and Baycorp was 5c weaker at 11195.

- NZPA