After a mostly positive start to the day, the S&P/ASX 200 (Index: ^AXJO) (ASX:XJO) has been dragged lower this afternoon thanks to Telstra Corporation Ltd (ASX: TLS). At lunchtime, the benchmark index had fallen 0.22% to 5,916 points.
Unsurprisingly, the telecommunications sector is by far the worst-performing sector today, with better performances coming from the gold and consumer staples sectors.
A number of shares are doing it really tough today, including:
Telstra Corporation Ltd (ASX: TLS)
The Telstra share price has fallen by as much as 8% today after rival, TPG Telecom Ltd (ASX: TPM), announced it was entering the mobile market after winning a spectrum auction earlier this month. TPG will spend around $1.9 billion to build its network, which is expected to cover around 80% of the population. A new market entrant is certainly bad news for Telstra which has already been struggling to find growth in an increasingly competitive market. Shares of Telstra are now trading at levels not seen since 2012.
Vocus Group Ltd (ASX: VOC)
The Vocus share price has continued to unravel today, falling another 4.5% to $3.40. This means the shares have now lost around 21% of their value since the start of April. A number of issues have been plaguing the shares recently and today's announcement by TPG is certainly not helping investor sentiment across the sector. Nonetheless, Vocus is now trading at a level that looks very appealing and could offer investors a significant level of upside over the medium term.
Chorus Ltd (ASX: CNU)
The Chorus share price has dropped more than 2.5% today after the New Zealand-based telco provided a weaker-than-expected March quarterly update. Unfortunately, the company experienced a decline in connections over the quarter with total fixed line connections falling by 39,000 and total broadband connections falling by 15,000. On a more positive note, March was Chorus' busiest ever month for fibre connection activity and the company is looking to increase this momentum with a recently launched marketing campaign aimed at encouraging customers to upgrade to its fibre network.
Ramelius Resources Limited (ASX: RMS)
Ramelius Resources is one of the few gold companies trading in negative territory today after announcing it missed its March quarterly production guidance due to heavy rain and equipment failures. The gold miner could only manage to produce 28,000 ounces of gold in the quarter, which was well below its guidance of 30,000 to 34,000 ounces. Ramelius has also warned that its production costs are expected to be above its guidance of A$1,100 per ounce and this has seen the shares fall more than 3% today to 50 cents.
