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Technology Stocks : Ascend Communications (ASND) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Chris Ariens who wrote (39358)	3/16/1998 5:46:00 PM
From: Nazbuster	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 61433

I read/printed the Secure Networks report since I have an Ascend Pipeline 50 for our 5-person office. Here's what it is all about: 1) Ascend implemented a system whereby they can broadcast a message to the network with an identifier to which only Ascend routers will respond. Once the routers respond, the network management software has a picture of the whole Ascend network world in question. 2) This is done using a specially formatted UDP packet to the "discard" port (port 9). [I'm quoting... I don't know this stuff.] 3) There are two passwords built into the routers which allow read and write access by SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol). The factory delivered default values are "public" and "write". There are two problems: People can use the default passwords (or others easily guessed) to access the routers and grab the entire configuration, including other passwords for maintaining the router itself; and, It is possible to jam the router by sending an invalid UDP packet to port 9. The first problem is solved by changing the passwords. (DUH!) I just did this for my own router in about 30 seconds, and I'm NOT a network person. The second problem is a little more difficult, but they suggest temporarily blocking messages to port 9. This DOES look like a buying opportunity for ASND stock. This whole thing is no big deal, IMO. Any system, Ascend router or otherwise, is vulnerable in exactly the same way if the passwords for access are publicly known...

To: Chris Ariens who wrote (39358)	3/16/1998 6:04:00 PM
From: Van Vo	Respond to of 61433

While IOM, MU's 1Q98 earning are both significantly below the concensus estimates, the market today is just unbelievable. DOW up +116.33 (1.35%) NASDAQ up +16.5 (0.9%) S&P500 up +10.66 (1.0%) Please read the article below to see how crazy the market is: biz.yahoo.com Monday March 16, 1:15 pm Eastern Time U.S. stocks rallying sharply at midday By Jennifer Westhoven NEW YORK, March 16 (Reuters) - Wall Street stocks were higher at midday on Monday as investors, reassured by comments by billionaire investor Warren Buffett, continued to pour money into the stock market amid a continued positive outlook for the U.S. economy. ''Today is unbelievable. We're seeing easily three buying orders for every selling order,'' said Frank Calta, managing director of institutional trading at Dain Bosworth. The Dow Jones industrial average was up 66 points to 8669 at midday, a gain of 0.80 percent. The Dow was pushed sharply higher by gains in J.P. Morgan & Co Inc (JPM - news), with shares of the bank up 6-5/16 points to 131-5/16. Traders said the stock was benefiting from yet another round of takeover rumors as well as positive comments from influential UBS banking analyst Thomas Hanley. The Dow was up nearly 0.80 percent, beating the Nasdaq and Standard & Poor's 500 Index on a percentage basis. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was up 6.80 to 1075.41, a gain of 0.64 percent, at midday Monday. The Nasdaq had risen 0.63 percent, gaining 11.25 points to 1782.91. Advances led declines by 16 to 11 on steady volume of 281 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange. Small-cap stocks were also rallying, although the gains were laggard. The Russell 2000 Index was up 2.28 points or 0.49 percent to 471.05 by midday Monday. Traders said the bullishness was slightly overwhelming. ''It's a little frustrating because it's getting very hard to find sellers -- so you can't get some of these stocks for your customers,'' Calta said. A raft of merger announcements helped stocks, but traders also pointed to words from Warren Buffett, a widely influential investor called ''The Oracle of Omaha. In an annual letter to shareholders released Saturday, Buffett said: ''There is no reason to think of stocks as generally overvalued'' -- as long as interest rates hold steady or decline, and corporate returns on equity remain high. Wall Street is still closely watching to see how the first quarter will shape up, with analysts divided over which industries will be impacted most by interest rates, El Nino, and the Asian fiscal crisis. Shares of Micron Technology Inc (MU - news) rose 1 to 34-1/4 in heavy trading Monday as traders anticipated the company's second-quarter earnings report, due today. Analysts are forecasting a loss of $0.18 a share on average. But not all the news on the earnings front was good -- Iomega Corp (IOM - news) shares fell 18 percent or 1-1/2 to 7-1/8 after it warned of a quarterly loss due to slower sales and higher marketing expenses. In merger news, Alltel Corp (OTC BB:ALTEM - news; AT - news) confirmed it would buy 360 Communications (XO - news) for more than $6 billion. Alltel fell 1-5/16 to 44-1/2 and shares of 360 Communications, which had run up ahead of the official announcement, dropped 4-1/8 to 31-1/4 on the NYSE. Abbott Laboratories Inc (ABT - news) said it would buy International Murex Technologies Corp (MURXF - news) for $234 million or $13 a share. Abbott rose 3/16 to 78-1/16 and International Murex rose 2-1/16 to 12-3/4. The benchmark long bond was up 17/32 to yield 5.86 percent, helped by a stronger dollar.

To: Chris Ariens who wrote (39358)	3/16/1998 6:10:00 PM
From: martin davies	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 61433

PC Week-Katt Rumur re LU/ASND: Restrictions on Lucent's making major acquisitions end this month, and tipsters are burning up the networking wires with speculation that Ascend will become the AT&T spinoff's enterprise access acquisition, giving Lucent instant legitimacy in the data-access world. I just read this in today's PC Week. Opinions? MARTDAV

To: Chris Ariens who wrote (39358)	3/16/1998 8:58:00 PM
From: username	Respond to of 61433

<<devious 'plot'>> nothing devious about it; seems pretty clear to me! This is one of the times when it would be nice to ask the engineers at ASND what the scoop is. (I have no idea what they would say, but I would bet money they would laugh before they said anything.) ASND looks fine to me, it's trading in a pretty tight range with some good support below it. That yahoo on the other thread should join SI and play the next contest. P.S. What aboot (Canadian accent) this LU story that their time limiter on aquisitions has expired? I thought it was in October. P.P.S. I miss this! :o)pete