MARKET CLOSE: NZ shares down

MARKET CLOSE: NZ shares down, Orion Health, Kathmandu fall while TradeMe gains

By Sophie Boot

Nov. 11 (BusinessDesk) - New Zealand shares declined at the end of a volatile week that saw Donald Trump win the US presidency. Orion Health Group and Kathmandu Holdings led the index lower, while Trade Me Group rose.

The S&P/NZX50 dropped 35.93 points, or 0.5 percent, to 6,697.79. Within the index, 32 stocks fell, 12 rose and seven were unchanged. Turnover was $177.3 million.

"We've had a bit of a rough day today and I think we've got more in store," said David Price, broker at Forsyth Barr. "A good thing to remember is this isn't going to blow over in the course of a few days, we'll have quite a lot of volatility before things really get bedded down offshore. You have seen quite a strong sell off in the interest rate sensitive stocks. The market's had a pretty strong run over a long period of time, it has been stretched on historic multiples and there's probably room for it to come back a little further."

Orion fell 6.7 percent to $2.80.

"It's fallen on a lack of volume and that's what we're seeing at the moment, the movements are accentuated by a lack of volume," Price said. "We've had a lot of people domestically who've been allocating offshore, because they feel offshore assets are better value, so when something comes through it's not met with the wall of buying that we had seen previously."

Kathmandu Holdings dropped 4.5 percent to $1.91, while Auckland International Airport dropped 3.3 percent to $6.11.

Infratil fell 2.2 percent to $2.88. The listed infrastructure investor reported a 7.1 percent fall in earnings as its Perth Energy division faced difficult retail conditions in Western Australia, and the company now sees its annual result tracking at the bottom end of its forecast.

Trade Me Group was the best performer, up 3.7 percent to $4.72. Westpac Banking Corp rose 3.6 percent to $33.60, and Australia & New Zealand Banking Group gained 2.9 percent to $29.80.

Sky Network Television advanced 1.4 percent to $4.30. The date for a decision on its Commerce Commission application to merge with Vodafone New Zealand has been pushed back to Dec. 21 from today to let the regulator process new submissions and cross submissions.

Warehouse Group was unchanged at $3. New Zealand's largest publicly listed retailer increased first-quarter sales with uplifts across all its brands ahead of the key Christmas trading period.

Outside the benchmark index, Seeka was unchanged at $4.50. The largest kiwifruit grower in New Zealand and Australia says it has settled a second insurance claim from a 2015 fire, and has updated its earnings guidance to reflect the "extraordinary gain" of $3.6 million

AFT Pharmaceuticals was unchanged at $3.15. The maker of ibuprofen-paracetamol painkiller Maxigesic said its operating loss widened to $8.4 million in the first half as it continues with its global rollout and trials new versions of its products.

(BusinessDesk)

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