Sharemarket keeps sliding despite strong overseas leads

The sharemarket continued to slide lower on Friday as ruthless investors punished companies that failed to deliver positive surprises this reporting season.
The bourse began the day higher, buoyed by a strong lead from Wall Street, where the Dow Jones hit a four-year high. But the market progressively gave up its gains as profit-takers again sold blue-chip stocks.
At the close the ASX 200 was down 20.7 points at 4799.9 while the All Ordinaries had dropped 18.4 points to 4748.5.
Compared with the previous Friday's close, the ASX was down 71.6 points or 1.5 per cent while the All Ords was off 69.2 or 1.4 per cent.
On the Sydney Futures Exchange the March share price index contract had fallen 25 points to 4767 on volume of 15,482.
CMC Markets senior dealer James Foulsham said the Australian market continued to look shaky, despite the positive leads from overseas.
"The early market strength was seen as an opportunity by traders who have been unwinding long positions over the past week to continue their selling," Mr Foulsham said.
"The uncertainty in the market has been evident in the reaction to company results, with companies having to beat analyst forecasts significantly to get any kind of positive reaction out of the market."
Mr Foulsham said ASX Ltd was a perfect example. "The ASX reported a 38 per cent rise in first-half profits today, which is in line with expectations, but the shares traded down over 2 per cent for most of the day."
ASX fell $1.13 or 3.3 per cent lower to $33.24. But shares in gaming company UNiTAB jumped 43c or 3.4 per cent to $13 after it reported a 25 per cent lift in first-half net profit to $41.15 million.
Other companies recently reporting included AMP, which on Friday made a small recovery from Thursday's losses, rising 2c to $8.38.
But BHP Billiton fell 41c to $23.88 despite earlier this week announcing the biggest interim profit in Australian history. Rival miner Rio Tinto also fell, losing 24c to $71.65.
Energy companies got a boost from a lift in the oil price overnight, with Woodside closing 51c higher at $40.21, Oil Search gaining 9c to $3.46 and Santos adding 9c to $11.89.
Gold miner Newmont rallied 20c or 2.7 per cent to $7.56 but Newcrest slipped 14c to $23.53. The spot price of gold rose strongly, up $US6.75 to $US545 per ounce.
The big banks were weaker, with NAB down 2c to $35.48, Commonwealth Bank losing 14c to $43.99, Westpac shedding 15c to $22.98 and ANZ down 10c to $24.75.
Among other financials, Macquarie Bank fell 27c to $59.58 but Axa added 8c or 1.5 per cent to $5.39.
Shopping centre owner Westfield closed 23c lower at $16.95 despite announcing a $US2 billion ($2.71 billion) redevelopment program for some of its US malls.
Media conglomerate News Corp lost 11c to $22.82 with its non-voting shares backtracking 4c to $21.64, while Publishing & Broadcasting shed 23c to $15.60 and newspaper publisher John Fairfax fell 4c to $3.90.