New Zealand shares fell following a selloff on Wall Street on Friday, with index futures pointing to further US weakness. Pushpay Holdings, Kathmandu Holdings, Synlait Milk, Summerset Group, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, a2 Milk and Ebos Group all dropped more than 3 per cent.
The benchmark S&P/NZX 50 Index fell 173.46 points, or 2.1 per cent, to 8,241.83. Within the index, 49 stocks declined, none rose and one was unchanged. Turnover was $92 million.
"It's a pretty broad-based pullback," said James Smalley, investment adviser at Hamilton Hindin Greene. Futures trading shows US benchmarks will fall further, and "our market is trying to anticipate what's going to happen in the US tonight".
Smalley said volumes were relatively light on the New Zealand bourse with many investors content to "sit on the sidelines" pending company earnings this month before reviewing their holdings. So far there have been few profit warnings, which suggested earnings would be close to consensus, he said.
One company that did provide a profit warning, CBL Corp, was unchanged on the day at $3.17, having fallen 18 per cent in the past 12 months. The credit surety and financial risk insurer said today that it had a net loss of $75m to $85m in calendar 2017 because of an increase in the future claims reserve for its French construction insurance business and a write-off of receivables in that business. As a result, it was planning to raise more capital.
