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Technology Stocks : Lucent Technologies (LU) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Phoenix who wrote (6300)	2/17/1999 11:24:00 PM
From: puborectalis	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 21876

Lucent sets 2-for-1 stock split Reuters NEW YORK -- Lucent Technologies Inc. , the world's largest maker of telecommunications equipment, Wednesday announced plans for a two-for-one stock split and outlined expectations for strong, future growth. Word of the stock split, its second in 12 months, raised cheers among the 500 shareholders at Lucent's annual meeting, held at the DuPont Playhouse Theater in Wilmington, Del., and for a time pushed its high-flying stock price higher. ''Today's announcement not only recognizes Lucent's growth, but also the opportunities that lie ahead for our company and our shareholders,'' Lucent Chairman Richard McGinn said. Shares of Lucent gained $1.75 to $99.75 in heavy trading Wednesday morning on the New York Stock Exchange before giving back the gains in the afternoon. Lucent was off 50 cents at $97.50 by mid-afternoon. The stock has surged 110 percent over the past 12 months but has backed off since reaching an all-time peak of nearly $120 in early January. Lucent's stock split follows similar moves earlier this year by other bellwether technology companies such as International Business Machines Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Intel Corp. The split, which was widely expected, was made possible by shareholders' approval of an increase in the number of shares outstanding to 6 billion from 3 billion. Lucent will issue the new shares on April 1 to shareholders of record on March 5. On Jan. 31, Lucent had about 1.32 billion common shares outstanding. Lucent currently has about three million shareholders, making it the second most-widely held U.S. stock behind AT&T Corp., its former parent. The split is Lucent's second since it was spun off from AT&T in 1996. Lucent's board approved the first split in February 1998. While stock splits do not give shareholders more value -- it is the equivalent of getting two $10 dollar bills for a $20 dollar bill -- stocks tend to rise on such news. Once the stock splits, the price for each share is reduced and it becomes more attractive to a wider range of potential shareholders, analysts said. Lucent plans to use its surging stock price as currency in its proposed acquisitions of Kenan Systems Corp., a billing software company, and Ascend Communications Inc., the fourth-largest maker of computer networking equipment. The $20 billion purchase of Ascend will make Lucent a major force in the fast-growing business of building computer data networks and will mount a challenge to networking industry leader Cisco Systems Inc. McGinn reiterated he expects the Ascend acquisition to be completed in the third quarter ending June 30. The deal will be neutral to earnings in fiscal 1999 and add to earnings in fiscal 2000. McGinn also said he expects the total communications market to grow 14.4 percent to $650 billion through 2001, with most of that growth coming from outside the United States. Lucent expects to grow faster than the overall market, he said. Much of the growth will come from new service providers. By the year 2000, there will be 1,000 new providers of phone, wireless and Internet service, a market Lucent plans to pursue aggressively. The market for equipment will also grow as Lucent projects about 700 million new voice lines will be installed in the next 15 years, the number of Internet users will double in the next three years and the amount of time people spend on the Internet will increase. McGinn said Lucent will continue to explore acquisitions, in areas such optical networking, data and wireless. At the annual meeting, shareholders also approved the election of three directors and defeated four shareholder proposals. TOP OF PAGE ©1999 Mercury Center. The information you receive online from Mercury Center is protected by the copyright laws of the United States. The copyright laws prohibit any copying, redistributing, retransmitting, or repurposing of any copyright-protected material. Silicon Valley News \| In Time For... \| Columns \| Companies \| Personal Computing Commerce \| Promotions \| Tools \| Help