Telecom falls 3c, market closes down

The New Zealand sharemarket's pre-reporting season drift continued unabated today with the benchmark index easing slightly while other markets in Asia rallied.

The benchmark NZX50 index closed down 9.969 points, to 0.312 per cent, at 3182.604, after losing early momentum. Turnover was worth $83.55 million. There were 30 rises and 38 falls among the 103 stocks traded.

Telecom fell 3c to 241 with the failure of its new mobile phone XT network continuing to annoy customers and generate negative publicity.

Auckland Airport continued to be on a trading halt today. The deadline for institutions to take up all or part of their entitlement was 2pm today. The stock last traded at 192 and new shares are being sold at 165.

Fletcher Building was unchanged at 807 and Contact fell 5c to 585.

"Once again there was very low activity. Everyone is just waiting for the reporting season to see how these companies are going," said Grant Williamson, director at Hamilton, Hindin, Greene.

There was no reaction to news that the Reserve Bank of New Zealand held the official cash rate unchanged at 2.5 per cent today.

NZOG fell 1c to 156 ahead of the release of its December quarterly report tomorrow.

Air NZ rose 4c to 124 with the airline announcing increased load factors in December among operating statistics released today.

Smiths City again highlighted its expansion plans in Wellington in its interim report today but its stock was untraded.

Nuplex fell 2c to 325 and NZ Refining fell 5c to 385.

Kathmandu rose 2c to 204 and it featured in volume statistics with $8.74m worth of its shares traded today.

Michael Hill fell 1c to 69 and Restaurant Brands rose 1c to 176. The Warehouse rose 1c to 383.

NZX rose 1c to 224 and Infratil rose 1c to 166.

Freightways rose 8c to 328 and Mainfreight was unchanged at 565.

US stocks rose on Wednesday after the US Federal Reserve pledged to keep interest rates near zero and stock futures signalled more gains ahead after President Barack Obama struck a conciliatory tone on banks in his State of the Union speech.

Stock index futures shot up in late after-hours trading as Mr Obama pushed job creation to the top of his agenda to bring down high unemployment, proposing the use bank bailout repayments to boost lending to small businesses.

Analysts said investors were relieved that Obama's speech did not slam banks and Wall Street anew after days of heightened unease about restrictions on bank risk-taking that Obama proposed last week, which helped fuel a global market sell-off.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 41.87 points, or 0.41 per cent, to end at 10,236.16. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index rose 5.33 points, or 0.49 per cent, to 1097.50. The Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 17.68 points, or 0.80 per cent, to 2221.41.

- NZPA