The Australian sharemarket climbed on Monday, led by blue-chip names such as the big banks and spurred on by merger and acquisition activity, while a leap in the iron ore price supported miners. Despite a weak lead from Wall Street, the S&P/ASX 200 index surged within an hour of opening and reached a high of 5733 in the middle of the day before fading to close at 5712.5, up by 1 per cent.