NZ Stocks: Global share weakness filters through to NZ stocks

New Zealand's share market lost over half a percent in morning business today, with softness on Wall Street on Friday filtering through to the local scene.

Telecom's 10c fall to 570 accounted for most of NZSE-40's 10.70 point fall to 2062.95 in the first hour and a half.

Turnover was $41.8 million of which $17.5 million was in Telecom.

Rubicon topped the turnover with 4.9 million shares worth $3 million traded. The company's announcement of a sale of its Brisbane fuels terminal and a $40 million return of shareholders' funds was well received. Its shares jumped 7 per cent, 4c, to 61c.

Air New Zealand came under new pressure with the A shares down 2c to 105 and the Bs down 2c to 144 after the Australian media reported the airline's Australian unit Ansett was likely to rack up $500 million losses this June year.

Brierley Investments, 30 per cent owner of Air NZ, fell 1c to 61.

JB Were broker Peter Stokes said the loss estimate was in line with his firm's estimate. He said JB Were had recently downgraded Air NZ again but the stock could be getting low enough to become an attractive buy.

There was good offmarket turnover worth $8.6 million in Lion Nathan, which was down 5c at 495. The decision on how many of its Montana shares are declared defaulter securities is likely to be one of the few headlines on an otherwise quiet corporate diary for the week.

Takeover target Richmond fell 7c to 310 on turnover of 82,000.

Industrial holding company Broadway Industries dropped 4c to 31 on light volume.

Software of Excellence rose 7c to to 142 after taking a big hit last week in the wake of its $697,000 year net loss, despite the result being better than forecasts. The stock was floated last year at $1.

Tower fell 4c to 536 and AMP fell 26c to 2520.

NZ Refining rose 15c to 1765 and GDC rose 10c to 235.

ANZ Bank fell 60c to 1950.

In all, there were 19 rises and 39 falls among the 99 stocks traded.

- NZPA