The market seemed to shrug off yesterday’s gains which were in part driven by news of a Japanese stimulus program, with the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index trading at 4413.4 points at the opening bell.

Sentiment picked up only slightly to bring the index to an intraday high of 4414.2 points but it wasn’t sustained and the market closed 0.5% lower at 4397.2 points.

The All Ordinaries struggled to hold ground, also dropping 0.5% to close at 4419.8 points.

No major local economic news was released today which didn’t bode well for the mining sector.

Along with oil and gas, basic materials fared among the worst of all sectors, dropping 1.5%.

A majority of the big miners posted losses, with BHP Billiton closing down 1.5% to $A33.70 while Rio Tinto dropped 2.1% to $56.58.

It was also a mediocre trading day for iron ore players on our Final Call watchlist, with Atlas Iron losing 6.8% to $1.57.

Fortescue Metals Group ended its recent price rally, with shares in the iron ore producer falling 2.4% to $3.60 after announcing it would use some of its $US4.5 billion credit facility to repay $715 million worth of unsecured loan notes.

Gold-focused companies also struggled, with Newcrest Mining closing down 0.6% to $A29.78 while Alacer Gold Corp lost 0.7% to $6.73.

Some of the big movers today included AAQ Holdings, with its shares soaring up 66.7% to 0.5c after entering into a binding term sheet with International Goldfields over the divestment of International’s Australian projects.

Meanwhile, Condor Blanco Mines rose 19% to 10c after announcing details of copper and iron ore offtake agreements with two Chinese companies.

All eyes will be on Norseman Gold in the next few days after it requested a trading halt regarding an imminent announcement relating to pending discussions with its financiers over its Norseman gold project operations.