It is noteworthy that the two stocks that contributed most to the rise in the Australian sharemarket on Monday, National Australia Bank and QBE Insurance, were the subject of market moving media reports but no ASX announcements. NAB shares got a kick along from a report in the Sunday Times in London that Spanish bank Banco Santander was contemplating a bid for NAB’s Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks. QBE shares jumped 3.3 per cent on the back of a report in The Australian Financial Review that relatively new chief executive John Neal was set to cut about 700 jobs in Australia as part of a bid to save $US200 million by 2014. It is clear from the sharemarket reaction that many investors took these two reports as signals to buy.

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