Devon Funds Management head of retail Greg Smith said the threat of tariffs on Mexico by US President Donald Trump is having an impact.
“This has been something that the company has talked about, obviously the investors have been aware of it, now we’ve got the reality, barring an eleventh-hour stay, which wouldn’t be perfectly surprising either,” Smith said.
“Assuming these turns actually remain in place, they could shift some production to New Zealand but that would come with a cost in terms of higher freight. They could also look to focus more on sales in Europe, which would be more tariff-free.”
He thinks the business will certainly face an earnings impact, potentially in the tens of millions of dollars to its bottom line.
Another stock of interest was Summerset Holdings, with its share price falling by 3.23% to $12.28, down 41c, with 352,254 shares trading hands to the value of $4,343,059.70.
“It’s still ahead of the game in terms of its result, which was quite a solid one, and eased some of the concerns over the sector given Ryman’s capital raise,” Smith said.
In more positive news, Spark performed well after its result last week, with its share price rising by 0.67% to $2.27, up 1.5c with 2,521,768 shares trading hands to the value of $5,721,111.95.
Freightways' share price also rose, increasing by 1.73% to $11.19, up 19c with 133,484 shares trading hands to the value of $1,477,841.28.
Smith said the Reserve Bank of Australia’s minutes would not have helped market sentiment, with the bank signalling more caution around further rate cuts, indicating inflation overseas may be more sticky, particularly with the impact of any tariffs.
Smith said investors and analysts would be looking out for the results of the Global Dairy Auction overnight, along with US President Donald Trump’s address to the American Congress.
“Obviously tariffs are really the big narrative at the moment, definitely the keyword in the market.”
US stocks closed sharply lower on Monday after Trump appeared to confirm tariffs would come into effect the following day against major trading partners Mexico and Canada.
“No room left for Mexico or for Canada,” Trump said at the White House when a reporter asked whether the levies would come into force from Tuesday.
“The tariffs, you know, they’re all set, they go into effect tomorrow,” he said.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 1.5% to 43,191.24, while the broad-based S&P lost 1.8% to finish at 5849.72.
The tech-rich Nasdaq took a harsher tumble, closing down 2.6% at 18,350.19.
Among individual stocks, chip titan Nvidia slumped 8.7% after the Singaporean authorities announced a probe into whether servers containing its chips that ended up in Malaysia may have contravened US laws against chip sales to China.
The servers were supplied to Singapore-based companies by US firms Dell and Super Micro Computer, according to Minister for Home Affairs K Shanmugam. Super Micro closed down 13%, while Dell’s shares fell 7%.
– Additional reporting AFP
Tom Raynel is a multimedia business journalist for the Herald, covering small business and retail.
