KEY POINTS:
PERTH - The Australian share market closed in positive territory after an erratic and directionless day for the bourse.
At the close, the S&P/ASX200 index was up 3.4 points to 6294.6, while the all ordinaries added 3.8 points to 6301.1.
At 1620 AEST on the Sydney Futures Exchange, the June share price index contract was nine points lower at 6305, on a volume of 17,539 contracts.
CMC Markets analyst David Land said a mixed performance at the big end of town resulted in an erratic day for the market.
"It was been a very choppy and largely directionless day," he said.
"We've had a mixture of performances from some of the bigger stocks which has really left the market hanging in a state of flux, with BHP higher and Rio lower, for example.
"We didn't have much in the way of a positive lead overnight ... and there really just wasn't a lot of injection of positive or negative momentum into the market."
The Dow Jones industrial average picked up 37.06 points to 13,383.84, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index dropped 1.96 points to 1,501.19 and the Nasdaq dipped 21.15 points to 2,525.29.
Locally, the big miners were mixed, with BHP Billiton gaining 29 cents to A$30.94 and rival Rio Tinto shedding A$1.06 to A$90.65.
The banks were mixed, with the National Australia Bank gaining nine cents to A$42.65, Westpac adding nine cents to A$27.58, the Commonwealth Bank picking up 13 cents to A$53.87 and ANZ dipping 14 cents to A$29.55.
CSR dropped 11 cents to A$3.54 after the building products and sugar company posted a 10.4 per cent fall in annual profit to A$273.3 million.
Investment firm Babcock & Brown Ltd gained 48 cents to A$31.00 after it bought a regional mall owner and operator in the US, marking its third major investment in the North American retail property market.
Jetset Travelworld Group surged 12 cents to A$2.07 after it raised its profit forecast for 2006/07, with the company now expecting a result 40 per cent higher than its last financial year.
Australia's largest listed eHealth company, IBA Health, dropped 4.5 cents to A$1.21 after it announced a A$368.5 million merger with UK-based iSOFT Group.
The retailers were weaker, with Woolworths shedding eight cents to A$28.50, Coles dropping 12 cents to A$17.68, David Jones retreating 10 cents to A$5.22 and Harvey Norman giving up 10 cents to A$5.21.
The media sector was weaker, with News Corp falling 18 cents to A$28.20, its non-voting shares losing four cents to A$26.11.
The James Packer-led PBL tumbled 24 cents to A$21.08 and Fairfax dipped five cents to A$4.98.
The energy sector was mixed despite an increase in the oil price overnight, with Woodside shedding 70 cents to A$42.10, Santos dropping 30 cents to A$12.60 and Oil Search was flat at A$3.90.
The spot price of gold was slightly higher and at 1627 AEST was trading at US$672.60 an ounce, up US$3.35 an ounce from yesterday's local close.
The gold miners were mixed, with Lihir Gold putting on two cents to A$3.15, Newcrest dipping 30 cents to A$21.84 and Newmont dropping four cents to A$4.85.
Nickel miner Australian Mines was the most traded stock, with 58.8 million shares changing hands worth A$7.6 million.
Australian Mines picked up one cent to 12.5 cents.
Preliminary market turnover reached 1.71 billion worth a total value of A$5.77 billion, with 617 stocks moving up, 642 down and 340 unchanged.
- AAP