Metal price recovery buoys local miners

The sharemarket closed stronger yesterday, pushed higher by commodities and precious metals stocks.
The ASX 200 gained 19.7 points to 5269.8, while the All Ordinaries rose 18.6 to 5217.7.
"There was certainly buoyancy in the metals market over Friday night with some stellar runs in a lot of the metal prices and this followed through to a couple of momentous performances in our resources sector today," Macquarie Equities adviser Helen Spencer said.
"In particular, there were some strong performances from Rio Tinto and BHP, which surged ahead, helping to push our market higher."
BHP Billiton climbed 91c to $31.01 while Rio Tinto rallied $1.75 to $82.55.
Energy stocks continued to rise after the price of oil climbed above $US75 a barrel for the first time on Friday night.
Woodside rose 11c to $48.01, Santos climbed 12c to $12.38 and Oil Search was up 11c at $4.50.
Hardman gained 5c to $2.43, as did Beach, to close at $1.47 after setting a record at $1.49.
Poor Cazaly, as expected, plummeted after the WA Government stripped the miner of the lease for the Shovelanna iron deposit, enabling Rio Tinto to reclaim the ground.
Having closed on Friday at $2.12, the shares opened at 45.5c, plumbed 41c and closed, down $1.455, or 68.6 per cent, at 66.5c.
The Commonwealth Bank fell 8c to $46.39, NAB was 21c lower at $36.99 and Westpac 5c weaker at $24.60. ANZ was up 13c at $27.68.
IAG was steady at $5.59 after revealing a worse-than-anticipated claims exposure of up to $135 million from Cyclone Larry.
Multiplex was also steady at $3.04. The construction group begins a court battle in London today as it sues Cleveland Bridge UK, the steel contractor which Multiplex blames for some of the problems with its late-running Wembley Stadium project.
ASX shares were steady at $33.11 after reporting a 25.9 per cent lift in net profit for the first nine months of the financial year to $99.8 million.
The operator of the national bourse, closed today for Anzac Day, said it expected a new pricing structure to boost revenue by about $10 million.
The battling gas companies gained, AGL added 6c to $18.46 and Alinta rose 1c to $11.01.
Telstra eased 3c to $3.76 while Optus parent Singapore Telecom eased 1c to $2.30.
Lihir Gold said it was on track to produce 670,000 ounces of gold this year and was expecting about 70 per cent would be sold at spot prices. Its stock rose 5c to $3.15.
In other golds, Newcrest fell 24c to $22.02 and AngloGold Ashanti 20c to $14.05. But Newmont was up 18c to $7.64 and Bendigo 4c to $2.36.
Gold itself was $US634.25.
Cazaly was the top traded stock by volume with 64.97 million shares worth $39.31 million changing hands.