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

To: P-san who wrote (41078)	3/25/1998 9:11:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Respond to of 61433

US OPTIONS FOCUS/Rolling up in U S West Media Reuters Story - March 25, 1998 20:30 %FIN %US %DRV %STX %.N/OPT UMG %BEV %BUS %ENT %REC %INSI MSFT %DPR DELL IBM V%REUTER P%RTR CHICAGO, March 25 (Reuters) - A huge call spread on shares of U S West Media Group that traded Wednesday looks like a bullish position that was rolled into a higher strike, traders and analysts said. "There's some institutional rolling going on," said a trader at the American Stock Exchange. All told, more than 19,000 July 35 U S West Media Group calls and 18,500 July 40 calls traded this session on the Amex. Open interest in the July 35 calls swelled by 20,000 contracts from March 2 to March 4, presumably when the position rolled today was first established, said Michael Schwartz, managing director of CIBC Oppenheimer. The calls traded at premiums of 1-1/2 to 1-7/8 over the three-day period in early March, he said. In today's transaction, the owner of the July 35 calls appeared to have turned around and sold them, taking a profit of about 7/8 per contract after paying 1-1/2 apiece for the July 40 calls, Schwartz said. "He's taking a profit and maintaining the position at a higher (strike) level," Schwartz said. US West Media Group is one of the nation's largest cable TV operators. Beyond the activity in U S West Media, technology issues were the busiest equity options as the sector overall got a lift from a forecast of strong earnings from software giant Microsoft Corp. . Microsoft stock surged 5 percent. The company said late Tuesday that its earnings in the current quarter and the next would exceed analysts' forecasts. "Microsoft's earnings news spilled over favorably into the rest of the tech stocks," Schwartz said. Microsoft and Dell Computer Corp. saw active turnover in both puts and calls, while options activity in International Business Machines Corp was slanted toward the put side. Steady buying of puts and selling of calls characterized the trade in IBM, most likely as hedges on purchases of the outright shares, said Ed Dolinar, a market maker in the IBM crowd at the Chicago Board Options Exchange. Volatility in April IBM options rose to about 28 percent over the course of the day from 25 percent in the morning, Dolinar said. IBM shares gained 2-9/16 to 106-1/16.