NZ stocks: Shares fail to shake off four-day losing streak

The New Zealand sharemarket lost ground yesterday for the fourth day in a row, negating some of the gains it had made previously in an eight-day run up.

Brokers said there was little direction from outside with the Dow up and the Nasdaq down in the US while Australia and much of Asia was on holiday.

"We were a bit of a lone soul today so I'm not sure you could take a definite trend," said UBS Warburg broker Campbell Stuart.

The NZSE-40 index dropped 1.73 points to 1975.63, the NZSE-SCI capital index fell 9.80 to 5216.15 while the top 10 index rose 1.42 to 876.73.

Turnover was 21.5 million shares, worth $889 million. Of the 135 shares traded, 33 rose but 55 fell.

Fletcher Building continued to suffer fallout from the shock departure of chief executive designate Alexander Toldte. It dropped 11c to $2.05 after its 14c descent on Wednesday when the news broke.

Market heavyweight Telecom recovered 8c to $5.46 and that helped the market recover somewhat from its morning lows.

Fletcher Energy shed 9c to $8.86 and topped turnover at $21.9 million and Forests was steady at 33c.

Fletcher Challenge announced on Thursday that the value of its Central North Island Partnership is to be written down by $574 million, and that when the company reports its result on February 28 it will be affected by net abnormal losses of $97 million.

Carter Holt Harvey recovered 2c to $1.58 after a dismal run in the wake of its third-quarter results this week. Declining pulp markets and concerns over the future of the US economy are likely to prevent CHH from making any immediate improvement on disappointing third-quarter results, analysts said.

INL ended steady after the appointment of two News Corp executives to key positions at the media giant that strengthened Rupert Murdoch's control over its future.

Rumours suggest the Murdoch men have been appointed to marry INL with its 47 per cent-owned Sky TV but Sky showed no sign of benefiting from such talk. It fell 9c to $3.50.

Radioworks picked up 15c to $9.30 after Canadian media company CanWest yesterday declared its takeover offer for the radio broadcaster unconditional. The announcement came after CanWest's investment vehicle Media Investments received acceptances from key Radioworks shareholders, allowing it to boost its stake in the company to 90.57 per cent - the level it needed to trigger a compulsory full takeover.

CanWest, which owns TV3, TV4 and the More FM network, declared its $9.45-a-share raid on the 28 per cent of Radioworks it did not already own on December 15.

Media Investments' offer will remain open for acceptance by remaining shareholders until January 31. The company intends to begin the process for compulsory acquisition of remaining shares next week.

Genesis continued its strong run this week following rumours its psoriasis drug has passed phase II trials in the US. It ended 5c higher at $7.35 following on from 35c and 25c rises in the previous two days.

The Warehouse was 4c lower at $5.60 - well down from a peak of $6.78 in mid-November.

Damba fell 7c to 37c while Renaissance rose 6c to $1.34.

Advantage Group gained 5c to $1.23, Air NZ Bs gained 5c to $2.13, Axa fell 6c to $3.44, Baycorp fell 20c to $13.00, NZ Refining rose 21c to $15.00, Scott Technology fell 12c to $1.98 and Sky City fell 9c to $8.70.

The New Zealand dollar remained firmly placed in a range pivoting around 43.55USc, and closed where it ended on Thursday.

The kiwi traded at 43.54c about 5 pm, down from 43.62c at 9 am.

The market was quiet with the absence of the Australians, who bowed out for Australia Day, and Hong Kong, with the continuing Chinese New Year.

The US dollar steadied in the Tokyo session yesterday after taking fright at a downbeat assessment of the US economy from Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan overnight. The Fed chief said growth was probably close to zero, although recession was unlikely.

- NZPA