KEY POINTS:
The sharemarket reversed yesterday's solid performance by turning its back on early gains, pushed into the red by market leaders as sentiment soured.
Having staged a turnaround yesterday to end up 0.8 per cent on the prospect of early interest rate cuts, the NZSX-50 benchmark closed down 0.7 per cent, or 24.4 points, at the day's low of 3601.17 today.
Turnover was just $79.3 million.
"Just a lack of conviction in our market really," said Stephen Wright of ASB Securities.
"Yesterday we were fired up with the prospect of interest rates, but today all we've got is a poor result from The Warehouse which, following on from Briscoe's the other day, just hammers home again how weak our economy possibly is."
Yesterday's news of 29,000 jobs lost in the March quarter, the worst loss since 1989, increased expectations for a cut in the Reserve Bank's Official Cash Rate (OCR) as soon as July, instead of the end of this year or early 2009.
Top stock Telecom closed down 14c, or 3.5 per cent, at 383, having been as high as 395.
Fletcher Building fell 19c, or 2.2 per cent, to 829, Contact Energy was down a cent at 902, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare lost 2c to 258, and F&P Appliances was down 4c at 261.
The Warehouse plunged 15c, or 2.7 per cent, to 535 after it became the second major retailer this week to announce falling sales, following poor sales from Briscoe Group on Wednesday, as demand softened.
For The Warehouse Group, third quarter sales were down 4.3 per cent from a year earlier to $394.6m. Year-to-date sales were 1.4 per cent down at $1.34 billion.
Sky City was down 4c at 393, Auckland Airport was flat at 220, Air New Zealand was down 3c at 117, Mainfreight was down 5c at 670, and Hallenstein Glasson fell 3c to 348.
Sky TV rose 4c to 450, Guinness Peat Group was up 5c at 178, Steel & Tube gained 5c to 326, Trustpower was up 13c at 808, and Freightways rose a cent to 331.
Exporter Rakon dipped 4c to 313 as the currency steadied, seafood exporter Sanford was flat at 455, and Pumpkin Patch was also flat, at 175.
Dual-listed stocks reflected gains on the Australian sharemarket, with ANZ up 110 at 2860, Westpac up 83c at 3153 and AMP up 10c at 910, although Lion Nathan fell 12c to 995.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index was up 0.8 per cent at 5767.
Earlier, Wall Street gave a modestly positive lead despite soaring oil prices, after retail giant Wal-Mart reported sales were holding up better than expected.
- NZPA
