NZ shares drop as stocks shed dividend rights; Synlait, Heartland, A2 fall

The S&P/NZX50 Index fell 126.4 points, or 1.4 percent, to 9,101.6. Within the index, 38 stocks fell, nine rose and three were unchanged. Turnover was $131.4 million.

A lot of today's weakness came from large stocks going ex-dividend, with Air New Zealand, Heartland Bank, Trade Me Group, Sky Network Television and Vector all giving up dividend rights.

"We also had mixed offshore leads and there are concerns about emerging markets with a more recent addendum to the Trump trade wars," said Peter McIntyre, investment adviser at Craigs Investment Partners. "Sometimes when markets get a bit skittish those stocks that have done well tend to get sold off to a greater extent than those that haven't."

Leading the index lower was Synlait Milk, down 4.9 percent to $12.75. It's the best-performing stock on the index so far this year, up 86 percent. The second-best performing stock, A2 Milk which is up 54 percent, dropped 4.2 percent to $11.88.