Lower metals, oil drag market down

The sharemarket fell as frenzied selling of base metals and a serious slip in the oil price on Friday punished local resource stocks.
But a resilient banking sector helped moderate the decline.
At the close the ASX 200 index was 18.3 points lower at 5418.4, while the All Ordinaries had fallen 19.3 points to 5389.9.
At 1615 on the Sydney Futures Exchange the December share price index contract was up 3 at 5435 and had swung around to a 15-point premium to the physical, the first premium in two weeks.
Copper was the biggest dipper on Friday on the London Metals Exchange, falling by more than 5 per cent on rising stockpiles, but nickel, zinc, aluminium, lead and tin also lost a lot of ground.
Big miner BHP Billiton was hit hard by the falls, losing $1.09, or 3.9 per cent, to $26.84. Rival Rio Tinto tumbled $2.94 to $77.52.
Aluminium processor Alumina crumpled 8c to $6.29 and zinc and lead miner Zinifex, which had been enjoying record zinc prices, fell $1.38, or 8.13 per cent, to $15.59.
Woodside Petroleum fell 30c to $38.32 as crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange shed $US1.57 on Friday to settle at $US59.59 a barrel and hadn't picked up much on early trading last night.
Santos and Oil Search dropped 22c and 7c to close at $10.88 and $3.39 respectively.
ABN Amro Morgans private client adviser Bill Bishop said the market had obviously been dragged down by resource stocks.
"But not to be forgotten are the banks, which have many times been called overpriced and at the end of their run.
"But they're up again tremendously," Mr Bishop said.
National Australia Bank was up 70c to $39.31, the Commonwealth advanced 69c to $48.25, ANZ climbed 7c to $28.60 and Westpac rose 21c to $24.89.
Mr Bishop said takeover speculation in the market may have boosted stocks such as Ten Network, up 11c at $3.39.
"Every second day a new stock comes into the line of fire of private equity people - I don't know of anything going on with Ten specifically but it may well be the speculator's stock of choice for the day."
As for the resources sector, Mr Bishop said investors shaken by yesterday's events should stay calm.
"This is probably a short-term reaction, people shouldn't get too worked up about it.
"BHP, for example, has certainly been thrashed.
"So they've had a bad day, but they've also had a great run for two years.
"I think anything under $27 is a pretty good buy for BHP so if it falls much further there will probably be plenty of buyers."
Other media stocks helped prop up the market.
PBL made 12c to $19.32, News Ltd lifted 13c to $29.03, its non-voters rising 25c to $28.02, and Seven Network made 23c to $10.09.
Entertainment group Village Roadshow shot up 30c to $2.90 after shareholders were rewarded with an interim dividend and $130 million capital return.
Telstra was also stronger, picking up 2c to $3.94, ahead of its annual meeting in Melbourne tomorrow.