Australia shares slip 0.8 pct

Australian stocks fell 0.8 per cent on Thursday to their lowest in nearly a week.

Australian stocks fell 0.8 per cent on Thursday to their lowest in nearly a week,hurt by banks and miners on worries about European banks and slowing euro zone growth,while top brewer Foster’s and phone firm Telstra stemmed the drop.

Foster’s jumped as much as 6 per cent after rejecting an offer of up to $2.5 billion for its wine arm,sparking bets it could get better offers for a business that has suffered from management mistakes,currency headwinds and a global wine glut.

The shares ended 4.5 per cent higher at their highest level since January 2008.

“The one positive side is people could genuinely be interested in the wine business. At least that’s encouraging,” said Jason Beddow,chief executive of Argo Investments,which owns a small stake in Foster’s.

Investors and analysts said Foster’s would probably be willing to sell the business for closer to its book value of A$3.1 billion.

“I don’t think they’ve done the wrong thing,” said Beddow.

Dealers played down the impact of the resolution of Australia’s election impasse,saying the market had largely expected the Labor Party would win enough support from independents to form a government and would go ahead with a mining tax.

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“A lot of the result was priced into the market. Some sort of resource profits tax was expected,” said Michael McCarthy,head of dealing Asia-Pacific at broker City Index.

“If anything,the market’s breathed a sigh of relief that the distraction’s over.”

The end of the election uncertainty helped Telstra Corp,as the Labor Party has agreed to pay the company $11 billion for its phone lines as part of a new national broadband network.

BHP Billiton,Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals Group all fell over 1 per cent.

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The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index fell 36.04 points to 4,537.20,to its lowest close since Sept 2,according to latest available data.

New Zealand’s benchmark NZX 50 index fell 12.96 points to 3,161.18.

Takeover target Andean Resources fell 7.5 per cent after Eldorado Gold Corp walked away from its bid for the Argentina-focused gold explorer,in face of a higher offer from Goldcorp worth C$3.6 billion ($3.4 billion).