The Australian December half earnings reporting season finished today with several large groups reporting interim of full year results See the Diary).

But the real story will again be the flood of poor reports, mostly from small miners, that will be released in their hundreds during the day and into this evening.

Failure to release reports could see the company involved suspended by the ASX.

QR National and QBE will both release reports today and both are expected to show falls.

QBE has already warned of a fall of 30% or more in profit, QR National will be releasing its first profit report since listing last year. It faces pressure on earnings from he flooding in the Queensland coal fields in December, and the floods in January will hit the second half result as well.

Apart from these and the mass of other reports (also watch for Downer EDI), the reporting season is over.

Last week saw confirmation that retailers were doing it tough with Woolworths reporting a modest increase, Harvey Norman a 17% and David Jones a small fall in sales for the second quarter and first half.

The AMP's chief strategist, Dr Shane Oliver says