Spooked by ongoing concerns about the global economy and surging oil prices, overseas investors bailed out of the New Zealand sharemarket last month, deepening its losses compared with most overseas bourses, NZX trading data for June shows.
With the MSCI World Index falling by 8.2 per cent during
June as stormclouds darkened over the global economy, the NZX-50's fall at 11.9 per cent was even worse, "with significant selling by offshore investors", said First NZ Capital's Jason Wong.
Hardest hit stocks were retailers, Sky City and Fletcher Building.
Skyrocketing oil prices, however, were good news for New Zealand Oil and Gas, which posted a gross return of 11.9 per cent for the month, the best performance among the market's top 50 stocks.
Yesterday's data also showed falls in the volume and value trading over the month.
The total value of trading on the NZX main board for the month at $2.4 billion was a whopping 13 per cent lower than a year earlier, while the number of trades was down 2 per cent.
The sharemarket's losses over recent months have seen its overall capitalisation fall to $55 billion - its lowest since May 2004.
Meanwhile, over the June quarter, Wong said New Zealand equities were the worst performing asset class monitored by First NZ Capital, for a third consecutive quarter, "reflecting a lack of overseas interest in the market and the run of poor economic data continuing".
The NZX-50 was down 7.9 per cent against the MSCI World Index's 0.8 per cent fall.
Bucking the trend, the NZX Small Cap Index was up by 4.7 per cent, but this was entirely due to the index's largest stock, Pike River Coal, surging 133 per cent over the period.
HIGHS AND LOWS
The NZX-50's best and worst performing stocks in June:
Best return:
NZ Oil & Gas 11.9%
Worst:
Hallenstein Glasson -26.7%
