NZ stocks: Market eases in quiet morning trade

12.00 pm

The sharemarket eased in quiet, morning business today.

Market leader Telecom, which initially rose 2c, was down 2c at 505 at 11.20 am. There were 1.6 million Telecom shares traded worth $8 million.

The benchmark NZSE-40 capital index was down 5.36 points to 2077.64 on volume worth $17 million.

There were 3 million Evergreen Forests traded worth $1.7 million. It was steady on 56c.

Yesterday's star, Auckland Airport, which soared 15c to 407 after its well received half year result, rose another 1c today.

Among the blue chips, Contact Energy was down 5c at 395, Air NZ down 1c at 36c, Carter Holt Harvey down 5c to 393, Fisher & Paykel Appliances down 10c at 930, Fletcher Building down 4c at 302, Sky City up 6c at 586 and Sky TV up 4c at 445.

Ports of Auckland fell 5c to 595 while Port of Tauranga rose 5c to 770.

Others to move included: AMP down 27c at 2280, Westpac NZ down 12c at 1880, GDC up 14c at 184, Blis up 2c at 60, Wellington Drive up 3c at 33 and Horizon Energy up 30c at 1330 on one small trade.

In all, there were 23 rises and 30 falls among the 95 stocks traded.

- NZPA