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

To: Narotham Reddy who wrote (46331)	5/8/1998 2:06:00 PM
From: gbh	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 61433

From briefing.com: 12:55 ET ****** ASCEND COMMUNICATIONS INC. (ASND) 44 7/8 +2 11/16. Wide area networking solutions providers is adding to its recent price gains as the stock got off to a good start this morning following a ratings upgrade from DLJ. The Wall Street firm raised its rating on the stock from "market perform" to buy" while setting a 12-month price target of $55. Shortly thereafter, Cowen & Co. issued an upgrade as well from "buy" to "strong buy" which has helped the stock maintain its upward momentum. Since the beginning of the year, the stock has made a very nice rebound, gaining more than 83% in the process. While some of the price gains were fueled by speculation that the company could be a takeover target, possibly by Lucent Technologies (LU 73 1/16 +1 3/8) given ASND's low valuation, it seems that the company has been able to overcome its short-term problems and is doing just fine on its own. In fact, since January, the stock has received thirteen upgrades from major Wall Street firms, with three upgrades coming from Cowen & Co. On March 23, Cowen went from "neutral" to 'trading buy." It followed this move by upgrading the stock again on April 13 from "trading buy" to "buy," and today it raised its rating to a "strong buy." Only Adams Harkness has bucked the trend during this period, downgrading the issue to an "underperform" from a "market perform," but this was after they had upgraded the stock on January 20 from an "underperform." Analysts have taken note that ASND, coupled with Cisco Systems (CSCO 75 7/8 +1/2) and FORE Systems (FORE 22 3/4 +1/4), has been able able to buck the trend afflicting other networking companies and actually grow top and bottom line results while remaining optimistic for 1998. The fact that ASND has provided greater earnings visibility going forward has been the major catalysts behind the stock's rebound. Although still shy of its 52-week high, the company continues to make steady progress towards the $60 level.

To: Narotham Reddy who wrote (46331)	5/8/1998 2:15:00 PM
From: djane	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 61433

LU announcement on Monday. LU thread speculation that it's a VoIP purchase To: Alain Joaris (2586 ) From: Curtis E. Bemis Friday, May 8 1998 11:05AM ET Reply # of 2600 Announcement by LU on Monday-- What is it ?? ADVISORY/Lucent Technologies to Hold Audio Press Conference Call Friday, May 8, 1998 10:31 AM ADVISORY...for Monday (May 11) --(BUSINESS WIRE)-- WHAT: Lucent Technologies' New Ventures Group will make a strategic announcement of a new business venture WHEN: Monday, May 11 at 10:30 a.m. EST WHO: Tom Uhlman, President of Lucent's New Ventures Group CALL-IN NUMBER: 800-288-8975 Members of the press will have the opportunity to ask questions during the call CONTACT: Lucent Technologies Chris Pfaff, 908/582-7571 800/705-2368 (pager) or Lucent Technologies David Bikle, 908/582-4120

To: Narotham Reddy who wrote (46331)	5/8/1998 2:17:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 61433

To the thread options gurus, is there a higher-than-normal premium for ASND options after 10/1/98? I'm just curious if the increasing noise in analyst reports, business mags and trade journals about a LU/ASND acquisition have been factored into the options. djane

To: Narotham Reddy who wrote (46331)	5/8/1998 5:44:00 PM
From: Leeza Rodriguez	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 61433

>> ''strong buy'' from ''buy'' by analyst Christopher Stix at Cowen & Co. << This is a very good sign because Christopher Stix was one of the first analysts to downgrade ASND on the way down. He was the first one to quantify that the price per port was falling at a faster rate than the demand of those ports. The fact that he is going positive is indeed very encouraging for other analysts. They respect this guy. I have not read his report (yet) but the indication here is that demand is now STRONGER than the pricing trends. I suspect that demand from the carrier(RBOC/CLEC) channel is about to step function UP. ASND has said many times that this market does not grow linearly, but in steps or waves. Put your boots on and get ready to step ;-) And another thing--Don't forget that ISP's are being encouraged to morph themselves into CLEC's due to all kinds of legal and regulatory advantages. That is very good news for ASND as these ISP's will upgrade their equipment to be suitable for 'carrier class'. Furthermore, ASND is working with the ISP community to show them how to make money from DSL. I saw Richard Sekar give a very detailed presentation at ISPCON on how ISP's can profit from DSL . This DSL functionality is integrated into the TNT. I can tell you that his presentation was very well received and a lot of ISP's went up to him afterwards. For the ISP's, DSL represents a higher margin opportunity. They are very keen and hot for the idea. ASND is holding their hand thru the process. ASND will be the DSL messenger as it will be the ISP-CLEC's who implement this technology. They have no T-1 cannibalization to worry about.The installed base of ISP-CLEC's is ASND's territory. Congrats to the longs for sticking it out. This is a company with astounding vision and thank the Lord they had the guts to buy Cascade. Lastly, don't forget that the $ 2.25 Billion PER YEAR Government slushy fund to connect schools and libraries to the Internet is about to start flowing. This will start trickling down to ASND and the other networkers in Q3. Stay long :-) Leeza Rodriguez