In Australia a curious week ended with a tiny, 2 point fall on Friday and a small 3 point dip for the week for the ASX 200.
But it was a week for punishment rather than reward for companies reporting their June 30 figures, even if on the surface the results were OK to solid.
But that hid some big price moves in the fallout from what was the busiest week of the earnings season.
BlueScope Steel plunged 20% over the week, Healthscope, sank 17% and telco Vocus, slumped 23%.
BHP added 5.1%, Rio Tinto 6.5% and Fortescue Metals was up a hefty 9.2%, Santos soared 11% and Oil Search 8.6%, while a2 Milk, jumped 13.6%. Shares in Qantas, which reported its second highest profit in history as well as a 7 cents a share final for shareholders and a buyback, saw its shares rose 5.5% last week.
Super Retail Group shares ended the week up nearly 3% thanks to the 7% plus surge on Friday after its better than expected figures. Bapcorp, a rival to SUL in the automotive sector, saw its shares add 4.8% over the week after releasing a solid report.
Woolies shares fell 3.4% over the week following its earnings release (investors are worried about the losses at Big W), The Commonwealth Bank fell 1.6%, IAG, dropped 5.1%, and Brambles, lost 4.3%.
The Reject Shop shares lost more than 11% as investors punished it for a very weak report and no dividends. Vocus also withheld a dividend as did Santos. Origin Energy also omitted its final dividend and warned there would be no interim.
