NZ shares tumble after global equity slump

The New Zealand sharemarket has tumbled early in the wake of sharp falls by global stocks.

Investors around the world cut their exposure to risk after weak Japanese data and last week's poor consumer confidence data from the United States sparked doubts about a US recovery.

"People have started to feel that the market rally moved well ahead of the actual economic improvement," said Vassili Serebriakov, currency strategist at Wells Fargo in New York.

Around 10.15am the benchmark NZX-50 index was down 54.09 points, or 1.8 per cent, to 3031.99, following on from a 65-point fall yesterday.

Big early losers included Fletcher Building down 23c to $7.41, Mainfreight down 19c to $4.80, NZ Refining Co down 15c to $6.75, Contact Energy down 14c to $6.15, Nuplex down 12c to $2.09, and Freightways down 10c to $3.00.

Sky City lost 8c early to $3.24, Sky TV was down 6c to $4.60, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare gave up 5c to $3.25, Infratil lost 5c to $1.76, Port of Tauranga was down 5c to $6.60, Rakon fell 5c to $1.39, and Ryman Healthcare also fell 5c, to $1.80.

The few early risers included retailer Hallenstein Glasson, up 3c to $2.93.

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In the US stocks suffered their worst loss in seven weeks on the weak data from Japan and a disappointing outlook from retailer Lowe's Cos.

Japan's gross domestic product showed its economy pulled out of recession in the second quarter, but at a slower pace than expected.

The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 2 per cent to end at 9135.34, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index slid 2.4 per cent to 979.73, and the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 2.8 per cent to 1930.84.

In Europe, the heavyweight banking sector took the most points off the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top regional shares. The index fell 2 per cent to 921.96, its lowest close since July 29.

"The market is too far ahead of the economy," said Giuseppe-Guido Amato, strategist at Lang & Schwarz. "We are not there (in recovery) yet. We have stopped the patient bleeding, but the cancer is still there."

The sell-off in Asia was broad-based with financials, industrials and materials providing the biggest drag on the MSCI index of Asia Pacific shares traded outside Japan. The index fell 3.7 per cent to its lowest since late July.

- NZPA