KEY POINTS:
The sharemarket traded quietly today, with investors seemingly watching developments in the New Zealand dollar.
Weaker offshore markets also dented sentiment, leading the NZSX-50 down 0.78 per cent or 32.90 points to 4194.56 on a modest $95 million turnover.
Grant Williamson, a partner in Hamilton, Hindin, Greene, said today's correction "really is a case of local investors still taking profits and no sign of any bargain hunters".
But he said things could change quickly if the Reserve Bank's currency intervention on Monday had the desired effect.
" Investors will be very wary that when they do start to see the kiwi dollar fall, it could fall quite quickly, so they'll be keeping a very close eye on things and export stocks will be one of the first things they'll be buying.
Most of the blue-chips were down, with the exception of Contact up a cent to 883. Fletcher Building fell 5c to 1275, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare was down 4c to 349; and its twin Appliances was down a cent to 369.
Telecom was off 4c to 459, in line with the broader market on low volumes.
"Telecom has broken below its recent trading range so it does look set to weaken a bit further from these levels," Mr Williamson said.
He did not think trading had been affected by a media report that internal candidate Marko Bogoievski was out of the running as a replacement for chief executive Theresa Gattung.
Other moves included the Warehouse down 9c to 603 on continued uncertainty about its future ownership; Nuplex down 15c to 680 after issuing a "slightly negative" earnings outlook last week; Sky City down 7c to 492; and Vector down 7c to 270.
Profit taking continued at Air NZ, down 7c today to 293, after a good run; and NZ Oil & Gas rose a cent to 103 after lifting its forecast operating earnings from its Tui field .
"Things are looking very good for the Tui oil development, we're possibly going to see some oil going to flow near the end of this month or next month, which would be very positive for New Zealand," Mr Williamson said.
NZOG was also floating off part of its interest in Pike River Coal whose IPO appeared to be going well.
Rakon, which was becoming "quite a volatile stock," fell 18c to 515.
Falls outnumbered rises 81 to 42 on 150 stocks traded.
- NZPA