NZ stocks: Montana active - FCL Energy retreats

Montana attracted the most interest on the sharemarket yesterday after brewer Lion Nathan confirmed it had bought investment company Guinness Peat Group's stake in New Zealand's largest wine maker.

Montana topped the sharemarket by both volume and turnover, with 7.1 million shares worth $18.5 million traded, but closed 3c lower at 275.

Lion told the Stock Exchange it now held all of GPG's 15.7 million shares, taking its Montana holding to 28.26 per cent. It bought the shares at $2.60 each - for a total cost of $41 million.

Lion Nathan fell 6c to 474.

Overseas Investment Commission consent was required before Lion - substantially owned by Japanese brewer Kirin - could complete the purchase as the deal took it beyond the 25 per cent threshold.

The NZSE-40 Capital Index closed 2.92 points (0.14 per cent) higher at 2091.10, while the NZSE SCI Capital Index of smaller stocks was down 34.14 points (0.63 per cent) at 5409.48.

Falls outnumbered rises 65 to 43 among the 155 stocks traded.

Deutsche Securities dealer Shane Gavegan said the sharemarket was quiet yesterday.

"There's not a lot of flow from offshore but that's not unusual on a Monday. Volume was pretty quiet, keeping to only $60.3 million."

Fletcher Energy, recently the darling of the sharemarket, weakened 13c to 872.

This was partly because Opec had increased oil production and partly because Energy's California-based investment Capstone fell more than $US9 to $US73.75 in the last day's trading in the US, Mr Gavegan said.

However, Energy's fall was on only 183,000 shares so "you can't read too much into that," Mr Gavegan said, adding he expected trading in Energy shares to be light until the Commerce Commission released its report on whether Shell could take over Energy .

Fletcher Forests closed 1c higher at 84 while Building was unchanged at 237.

Market giant Telecom was also lightly traded, Mr Gavegan said, with 1.24 million shares worth $7.94 million changing hands.

The stock strengthened 7c to 645 which was "not bad" considering how far the Nasdaq fell over the weekend, Mr Gavegan said.

In New York the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index fell 119.90 points, or 2.93 per cent, to 3978.45 as people fretted about financial results from computer and semiconductor companies.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 39.22 points to 11,220.65.

Elsewhere on the local sharemarket yesterday, UnitedNetworks rallied 25c to 680, Baycorp strengthened 9c to $13.39 and mall owner Westfield rose 5c to 420.

Contact and INL both closed 3c higher at 258 and 399 respectively, while Carter Holt Harvey gained 2c to 180.

On the negative side of the ledger, Telstra fell 18c to 820, Advantage was 10c weaker at 233 and TransAlta lost 8c after going ex a 5.1c dividend to close at 273.

The Warehouse and Axa both lost 5c to 595 and 355 respectively, while Infratil was 6c lower at 126 and Tranz Rail fell 3c to 395 after going ex an 8.5c dividend.

- NZPA