Sharemarket shows strength early
The New Zealand sharemarket rose in early trading, having shown resilience yesterday amid the drama of the receivership of South Canterbury Finance and the bailout of its investors.Around 10.15am the benchmark NZX-50 index was up 6.68 points to 3042.79, h
The New Zealand sharemarket rose in early trading, having shown resilience yesterday amid the drama of the receivership of South Canterbury Finance and the bailout of its investors.
Around 10.15am the benchmark NZX-50 index was up 6.68 points to 3042.79, having ended down just 0.7 points yesterday when it recovered from an earlier 15-point fall.
In early trading today Fletcher Building added 2c to 754 and Pike River Coal gained 2c to 102.
Some stocks that went ex-dividend today were lower in early trading. They included Contact Energy down 10c to 555, SkyTV down 6c to 501 and Telecom down 4c to 202.
In the United States, stocks ended little changed in choppy trading on the last day of the month.
Positive data surprises sustained a rally for most of the session, but declines in technology shares capped overall gains.
US consumer confidence rose more than expected in August and home prices ticked up in June, though a separate report showed business activity in the US Midwest grew in August a bit less than economists expected.
The Dow Jones industrial average edged up 0.1 percent to 10,014.72, the Standard&Poor's 500 ticked up 0.04 percent to 1049.33, and the Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.3 percent to close at 2114.03.
For the month, the Dow fell 4.3 percent while the Nasdaq tumbled 6.2 percent. The S&P 500 lost 4.8 percent, posting its worst August since 2001 in terms of percentage declines.
Further weighing on the market, minutes of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting suggested the outlook for the US economy would have to deteriorate "appreciably" to spur fresh support from the central bank.
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