Woodies drags rest of market into red

The sharemarket ended 1 per cent lower yesterday, weighed down by a production downgrade by the oil and gas giant Woodside Petroleum and a fall in the share prices of potential merger partners BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto.
The banks were also a drag on the market, falling amid concerns about a re-pricing of subprime mortgages in the US that kept Wall Street in the red.
But there were a few bright spots, with mining hopeful Fortescue Metals rocketing 19 per cent after it discovered a huge iron ore deposit in Western Australia.
The zinc and lead miner Zinifex surged 12 per cent on refreshed rumours of a takeover bid from rival Oxiana.
The ASX 200 index closed down 70 points at 6528.6, while the All Ordinaries was 55.6 points lower at 6594.4.
"In the top 20 you can't find a single stock that's actually gone up," said Intersuisse's director of equities, Andrew Sekely.
He said the top 20 stocks had significantly underperformed the rest of the market.
"I would say the fall was mainly because of overseas selling - most overseas institutional investors stick very closely to the top 20."
Woodside fell $3.80, or 7.31 per cent, to $48.20 after it slashed its 2008 production forecast by about 20 per cent.
BHP Billiton dropped $1.05 to $41.15 and Rio Tinto fell $2.12 to $134.59.
Fortescue shot up $9.67 to $61.20 after it announced it had found more than 1 billion tonnes of iron ore in the Pilbara region in Western Australia.
Zinifex jumped $1.69, or 11.74 per cent, to $16.09 on the Oxiana rumours. It also announced the appointment of the former WMC Resources boss Andrew Michelmore as its new chief executive.
Oxiana rose 6c to $4.06.
The banks all finished lower, with the Commonwealth down 85c to $60.45, NAB down 84c to $44, ANZ down 56c to $28.14 and Westpac down 49c to $28.22. St George was down $1.40 to $37.
Macquarie Group fell 55c to $81.10 despite a broker upgrade from Merrill Lynch. Fellow investment bank Babcock & Brown was up 40c to $27.90 but Allco Finance was down 9c to $6.88.
The retail and coal conglomerate Wesfarmers fell 27c to $39.60 even though it announced late in the day that trading for its Bunnings hardware chain was strong in the first four months of this financial year.
Fellow retailer Woolworths fell 37c to $32.37.
Seven Network announced that the pay TV provider Austar was on its radar and it planned to develop its multiple-channel business this year. Seven shares fell 9c to $13.40. Austar fell 3c to $1.47.
Ten Network shares gained 2c to $2.74 and News Corp shed 30c to $24.52, with the non-voters down 12c to $23.38.
Telstra dipped 1c to $4.71, while its receipts were steady at $3.20. The owner of Optus, Singapore Telecom, was down 2c to $2.94.
The gold price was up yesterday. Newcrest Mining firmed 34c to $33.73, Newmont was up 5c to $5.77 but Lihir dropped 3c to $4.01.
Apart from Woodside, other oil miners rose after New York crude oil futures closed higher overnight. Oil Search climbed 14c to $4.66 and Santos rose 24c to $13.50. Beach, though, was down another 4.5c to $1.355.