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Strategies & Market Trends : Waiting for the big Kahuna -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Gault who wrote (35001)	12/6/1998 11:25:00 PM
From: Jurgen	Respond to of 94695

oops

To: John Gault who wrote (35001)	12/6/1998 11:29:00 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Respond to of 94695

And now for something completely different..... <vbg> theage.com.au Friday, Dec 4th. Securities commission trailing in battle of the bug By JUDY MATTHEWSON The US Securities and Exchange Commission, which is pushing the securities industry to get its computers ready for Year 2000, has had trouble preparing its own systems for the next millennium. Mr Walter Stachnik, the SEC inspector-general, said the commission was ''having difficulties'' resolving the Year 2000 challenge because of problems at the Office of Information Technology, the SEC unit responsible for the job. ''Although the commission is making substantial efforts to ensure that its information systems are Year 2000 compliant, it remains a significant problem,'' Mr Stachnik said in his latest semi-annual report to Congress. A software problem could cause many computers to read the year 2000 as 1900 at the start of the new century. The stakes are high for the SEC, which relies on computers not only for tasks such as tracking enforcement cases, but also for the disclosure of public documents on its electronic data gathering, analysis and retrieval system, known as ''Edgar''. The US Office of Management and Budget wanted all federal agencies to compile information about potential Year 2000 glitches by last February, and to coordinate the transition with outside users of their systems by last March. Mr Stachnik said that as of the end of August the commission ''wasn't meeting those deadlines''. The commission has cracked down on brokerages that did not meet its schedule on Year 2000 computer readiness in the securities industry. In October, the SEC brought 37 cases against brokerages that missed a deadline for required reports on their progress in handling the computer problem. For federal agencies, the Office of Management and Budget wanted all government computer systems overhauled by September. It also wants each agency to check the new systems for bugs by January, and to have them running by March. Mr Stachnik said he did not know if the SEC made the recommended September deadline or was likely to meet the January and March ones. An SEC spokesman, Mr Chris Ullman, declined to answer questions about the OMB's target dates, saying the SEC had earlier set a target for next July. ''The commission established a time frame for Y2K remediation well before OMB established its time frame,'' Mr Ullman said. ''We fully expect to be Y2K compliant by our original target date of July 1999.'' The main problem the agency had with retooling for 2000, Mr Stachnik said, were ''long-standing weaknesses'' at its Office of Information Technology. Efforts to address the problem ''are complicated by the ongoing reorganisation and operational problems'' in that office, the report said. The information office was reorganising to deal with these weaknesses, Mr Stachnik said. The commission was not the only federal agency having problems, he said. As of 15August, according to the most recent OMB report on the subject, seven other agencies - including the Pentagon, the Energy Department, and the State Department - were ''not making adequate progress'', while another eight were having problems. BLOOMBERG