Sky City shares gain on convention centre news

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Sky City shares rose in early trading after it was revealed on the weekend that the company was negotiating with the Government over a proposal to build a $350 million convention centre in Auckland.

Shortly after the New Zealand sharemarket opened today, shares in Sky City were up 6c to 352, but the entertainment group was one of the few stocks to gain following a gloomy end to last week for shares in the US and Europe.

Around 10.15am today the benchmark NZX-50 index was down 9.24 points to 3481.39, after edging up 1.9 points on Friday.

Shares falling in the first few minutes of trading today included Restaurant Brands, down 8c to 250, NZ Refining Co down 5c to 385, Port of Tauranga down 4c to 870, Fletcher Building down 3c to 863, Hallenstein Glasson down 3c to 387, Contact Energy down 2c to 582, and Telecom down 2.5c to 229.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was among the few early risers, adding 2c to 295.

In the United States, the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index closed out their sixth week of losses on Friday as further signs of a global economic slowdown set the stage for more losses ahead.

The deepening gloom raised the prospect for the S&P, which suffered its worst week since August 2010, to break below the year's low of 1250 this week.

The Nasdaq wiped out its yearly gains on Friday and also posted its biggest weekly decline since August 2010, as the latest deterioration in sentiment came on fear of flagging Chinese growth and fresh worries about Greece's debt crisis.

The Dow fell 1.4 per cent to 11,951.91, the S&P 500 slid 1.4 per cent to 1270.98, and the Nasdaq Composite Index tumbled 1.5 per cent to 2643.73 at the close.

For the week, the Dow was down 1.6 per cent, the S&P 500 was off 2.2 percent and the Nasdaq was down 3.3 per cent.

European shares fell to a three-month closing low and posted their sixth week of losses. The FTSEurofirst 300 stock index dropped 1.4 per cent.

- NZPA