KEY POINTS:
The New Zealand sharemarket hovered above recent two-year lows today, but its 1.2 per cent decline was not as steep as losses in Australia and elsewhere.
Regional markets took the United States' lead, where all three major stock indexes fell more than 2 per cent on plunging commodity prices, and speculation that Merrill Lynch may need to take more write-downs.
The benchmark NZSX-50 index lost almost all of yesterday's gains, closing down 41.56 points at 3425.7 ahead of market holidays on Friday and Monday for Easter.
Turnover was $166.4 million.
Blue chips generally declined, mirroring the wider market. Top stock Telecom lost 10c to 382, Fletcher Building was down 9c at 856, Contact Energy was down 3c at 824, Auckland Airport lost 7c to 232, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was up a cent at 287, and F&P Appliances was steady at 235.
Sky City was down 4c at 363, while Sky TV rose 3c to 470.
Among the few top-50 stocks were Rakon, up a cent at 215, Pumpkin Patch, up 5c at 166 after news that a wealthy investor had bought 6 million shares in the company, and NZ Refining, up 5c at 715.
Air New Zealand was down 7c at 135, Mainfreight lost 16c to 563, Port of Tauranga was down 10c at 600, Nuplex lost 5c to 595, and and TrustPower fell 4c to 766.
Shares in small cap finance company Dominion Finance fell 4 per cent, or 4c, to a record low 86c after the company warned of a lower annual profit and declining assets.
Australia's benchmark index was down 3 per cent at 5127, pushed lower by companies such as miner BHP Billiton, while Japan's Nikkei share average was closed today.
Gold and other commodities slid today on doubts about the global economy, while Asian shares fell on renewed credit crisis fears.
Earlier on Wall Street, the drop of more than 2 per cent in all three major stock indexes came a day after the S&P 500 rang up its biggest one-day jump in more than five years following stronger-than-expected earnings from investment banks and the Federal Reserve's deep cut in official interest rates.
- NZPA
