NZ shares: Market edges down early, Telecom falls 1pc

The New Zealand sharemarket edged down in early trade as top stock Telecom lost more than 1 per cent.

Telecom's share price was down 3c early to $2.66, wiping out Friday's 3c gain, while among other leading shares Fletcher Building was also down 3c, to $6.51, and Contact Energy was down 1c to $5.75.

Hellaby Holdings dropped 9c to $1.20, taking it back down nearer to its share price before it shot up 28c last Wednesday after saying it had knocked its core bank debt back by more than a third to $51m over the past six months.

Around 10.15am, the benchmark NZX-50 index was down 3.64 points to 2757.86, having declined 6.7 points on Friday.

Traders were operating with even less offshore guidance than usual on a Monday morning, after United States markets were closed on Friday for the Independence Day holiday.

With the lack of direction from Wall Street, European stock exchanges were pedestrian at the end of last week.

While falls among the larger stocks dominated the sharemarket in this country early, some shares did made gains.

Port of Tauranga lifted 4c to $6.09, Sky City was up 2c to $2.60, and Rakon was up 2c to $1.42.

- NZPA