NZ stocks: NZ market eases on light volume

After two strong days of trading at the end of last week, the New Zealand share market sagged today on light volume.

The benchmark NZSX-50 index closed down 12.467 points, or 0.46 per cent, at 2698.801. Turnover was worth just $66.25 million. There were 52 rises and 36 falls among the 113 stocks traded.

With Wall Street little changed on Friday and Australia weaker the New Zealand market was left drifting.

"I just think people are taking profits," said Stephen Wright at ASB Securities.

Leading shares Fletcher Building and Telecom led the way down, with Fletcher dropping 21c to 655, while Telecom gave up 4c of its 9c gain from Friday to be at 250.

Contact Energy was down 1c at 578.

Nuplex rose 4c to 41. The company's rights issue closed today and a statement about how many shares shareholders purchased and how many were left to underwriters is expected tomorrow.

Shareholders who had a share worth $1.07 before the issue was announced have the right to buy seven shares at 23c each, equal to a total $1.61. They end up with eight shares worth 33.5c each so are ahead in a comparison with today's price.

Fisher & Paykel Appliances eased 2c to 45 as investors await news on a restructuring of the company's balance sheet. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare rose 8c to 305.

Infratil eased 1c to 157 as it announced the sale of properties in Auckland.

NZ Refining eased 15c to 680 and NZOG eased 3c to 138.

Hellaby eased 1c to 49. ANZ fell 25c to 2133 and Westpac fell 55c to 2550.

Tower rose 1c to 132.

NZX rose 13c to 688. NZ Farming Systems Uruguay rose 3c to 69.

Shares in the United States edged up on Friday (local time), after a strong surge which saw the Dow Jones industrial average rise 22.7 per cent in six weeks, its largest six-week gain since 1938.

"The rate of deceleration in the economy is slowing," said David Lutz, managing director of trading at Stifel Nicolaus Capital Markets in Baltimore.

"From a macro standpoint, the reason for a lot of the drive is just that we're continuing to get data points that show things are beginning to operate very well in the credit markets."

The Dow rose 0.1 per cent to 8131.33, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index climbed 0.5 per cent to 869.60, and the Nasdaq Composite Index added 0.2 per cent to 1673.07.

- NZPA