KEY POINTS:
The New Zealand share market eased 0.5 per cent today but a late pick-up in Telecom shares kept it from falling as far as its Asian and Australian counterparts.
The NZSX-50 benchmark index fell 17.87 points to 3470.96. Total turnover was a low $84 million, on 38 rises and 64 falls.
ASB Securities broker Stephen Wright said the market had been "subdued following on from poor markets overnight and of course, Australia and the all of Asia was weak today".
The index ended near its session lows but rallied briefly on buying in Telecom. The stock, which plunged 14c on Friday, recovered 4c to 362, although it touched a 15-year low of 356.
Investors are digesting details from a Telecom presentation last week which outlined its near to medium-term earnings prospects.
Similarly, Fletcher Building rose 10c to 830 after touching a two-year-low of 801 on Friday on generally poor market sentiment. Mr Wright said he put today's rise down to a lower exchange rate with the US.
The other contributing player to Friday's poor sentiment, Auckland Airport, gained 3c to 216 today.
Mr Wright said commentators had picked the stock to slump after the Government vetoed a Canadian partial takeover bid for the airport, but it was holding its own.
"It must be seen as an attractive stock at these levels."
UBS today raised its view of the stock to a "buy," saying that while there was a chance of short-term volatility in the stock, it should gain in the long term.
Transport stock Mainfreight also gained traction, up 11c to 636, albeit on low volume.
Poor retail sales for February appeared to impact negatively on retail stocks. Hallenstein Glasson fell 23c to 377 although 17c was due to a dividend; Pumpkin Patch lost 5c to 165; the Warehouse eased 5c to 565; and Michael Hill lost 3c to 89c.
Other movers included F&P Healthcare, down 7c to 278, Infratil down 4c to 209, Air NZ down 4c to 131, Contact Energy down 12c to 848, Sky TV down 16c to 460, and Rakon down 9c to 301.
Australian-related stocks generally took a tumble in line with the broader market there. AMP fell 26c to 903, ANZ fell 55c to 2395, Westpac fell 51c to 2590, and Nuplex fell 10c to 610. Telstra bucked the trend, up 17c to 532.
In mid-afternoon trading, Australia shares fell 2 per cent or 110.7 points to 5328.6, with financial firms and resource firms leading the way on renewed fears that the US was in recession.
Wall St also got the jitters, with the Dow Jones falling 2 per cent to 12,325.42 after surprisingly weak earnings from General Electric Co, an economic bellwether stock.
The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was down 27.72 points, or 2.04 per cent, ending at 1,332.83. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 61.46 points, or 2.61 per cent, at 2,290.24.
Shares of GE sank almost 13 per cent in their worst decline since the October 1987 market crash after a 6 per cent drop in profit.
A leading consumer confidence survey also had sentiment at a 26-year low.
"GE is a reminder that there is still bad news out there," said John Praveen, chief investment strategist at Prudential International Investments Advisers LLC in Newark, New Jersey.
"It keeps the financial problem and credit problem alive."
- NZPA
