KEY POINTS:
The New Zealand sharemarket extended Friday's hefty plunge, dropping another 1 per cent today on poor sentiment about the economy.
On Friday the NZSX-50 benchmark index lost 1.98 per cent or 65 points to its lowest point since December 2005 on record oil prices and concerns over the health of the US economy.
Today the index fell another 32.29 points to 3194.61 on a reasonable turnover worth $112m.
Morale-sapping data out today included building consents down 42 per cent on the previous month and the National Bank's monthly business outlook which showed a slightly improved but still negative confidence figure.
ASB Securities managing director John McMahon said most moves reflected a "reasonably pessimistic" view of the local economy, and earnings from stocks with New Zealand exposure.
Among the smaller stocks, Steel & Tube dropped 11 per cent or 32c to 258, Hallenstein Glasson lost 9 per cent or 26c to 242, Cavalier shed nearly 7 per cent or 17c to 228c, THL lost 6 per cent or 9c to 140, and Skellerup fell 6c to 80c .
Blue-chip Telecom eased 2c to 357, Contact fell 21c to 799, Fletcher Building regained 3c to 635, and Sky TV fell 13c to 412.
Other losers included the Warehouse, down 9c to 410, and Wakefield Health lost 10c to 870 following a recent raid on shares by a cornerstone investor.
It was also the last day of the quarter, which often resulted in a couple of index changes and portfolio rebalancing, Mr McMahon noted.
Coal miner Pike River joins the index tomorrow and was up 12c to a high of 245, replacing Hellaby Holdings which ended the day in a trading halt.
Hellaby last traded down 10c to 135 and announced after the market closed that it was selling its poorly performing BBQ Factory business.
PGG Wrightson lost 10c to 250 and cornerstone shareholder Pyne Gould Corporation lost 8c to 337 after Wrightson announced it was to take a 50 per cent stake in meat company Silver Fern Farms, formerly PPCS. The investment will cost Wrightson $220m.
The worst perfomer was troubled Dorchester Finance, off 2c or 13 per cent to 13c.
Among the few risers today, NZOG rose nearly 5 per cent or 8c to 178, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare rose 5c to 235, and its appliance twin rose 4c to 198.
In contrast, the Australia sharemarket rose weakly, up 0.3 per cent on gains in resource firms .
It got no leads from Wall St on Friday, where the Dow Jones industrial average dropped 106.91 points, or 0.93 per cent, to end at 11,346.51.
"We are already in a bear market. You see fundamentally sound companies being punished for the overall performance of indexes," said Peter Kenny, managing director at Knight Equity Markets in New Jersey.
- NZPA