Flat start for NZX

The New Zealand sharemarket was flat in early trading, as Telecom clawed back 1c early from the historic low it closed at on Friday.

Telecom edged up to 212, while NZ Refining Co lifted 9c to 385, The Warehouse was up 5c to 395, Rakon up 4c to 96, Fletcher Building lifted 4c to 839, and Air New Zealand was up 3c to 133.

Retailer Hallenstein Glasson fell 14c to 346, and Sky City fell 6c to 336, as both went ex-dividend.

Tower fell 5c to 194, Ebos Group was down 4c to 640, NZX dropped 3c to 192, Nuplex fell 3c to 327, and Port of Tauranga dropped 3c to 702.

Around 10.20am the benchmark NZX-50 index was up 0.45 points to 3230.85, after gaining 9.7 points on Friday.

In the United States, renewed worries about Greece sparked a climb in the greenback and weighed on US stocks.

Sectors sensitive to US dollar moves were hit hard, including materials, chip makers and energy.

The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 0.4 percent to end at 10,741.98, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index lost 0.5 percent to 1159.90, and the Nasdaq Composite Index shed 0.7 percent to 2374.41.

For the week, the Dow rose 1.1 percent, the S&P added 0.9 percent and the Nasdaq gained 0.3 percent.

- NZPA