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To: GST who wrote (41669)	2/21/1999 9:23:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Respond to of 164687

Posted 17/02/99 1:57pm by Will Knight Branson hits out at AOL as Virgin offers freebies As Virgin Net announced plans to jump on the free ISP bandwagon, Richard Branson has condemned AOL for taking its customers for a ride. Branson said today: "I read this morning that Frank Keeling, marketing director of AOL, believes that people will always be willing to pay to look at interesting and relevant content. We are offering it to the customer along with free access." Users of Virgin's free service may find they get stung by the £1 per minute charge for calls to the telephone support service. Dixon's Freeserve came under fire in November (see earlier story) for using a premium rate phone line service for support calls. It later halved the cost of support to 50p per minute. Alternatively, Virgin customers can receive free support for a reduced monthly rate of £5.99. AOL remains stubbornly determined not to bow to pressure and offer a free service itself. Virgin Net's new free access will be available to its existing 150,000 customers from 1 April and to the rest of us from 1 May. Virgin Net believes it will be able to offer a greater depth of content than other free ISPs and has claimed that its service will not slow down with the increased volume of traffic. David Clarke, chief executive of Virgin Net, said: "We will move all our existing subscribers over to the free package and then ramp up our operations to expand the offer to the general public." ®

To: GST who wrote (41669)	2/21/1999 9:34:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164687

Nikkei jumps as yen softens Tokyo stocks climb after G7 meeting; Australian share market opens mixed February 21, 1999: 7:33 p.m. ET Quiet end to stormy week - Feb. 19, 1999 Europe ends week mixed - Feb. 19, 1999 World Markets Tokyo Stock Exchange Hong Kong Stock Exchange Singapore Stock Exchange Sydney Stock Exchange Bridge News - Asia & Australia TOKYO (Reuters) - Tokyo stocks opened sharply higher on Monday as global blue chips rose after the Group of Seven industrial nations tacitly approved a weaker yen. An across-the-board rebound in U.S. stocks on Friday also improved sentiment. Shortly after the opening of trade, the benchmark Nikkei average was up 128.28 points, or 0.91 percent, at 14,226.32. March Nikkei futures rose 90 to 14,190. The yen will keep weakening over the day, keeping the stock market buoyant, said Yasuo Ueki, equity manager at Nikko Securities. Finance ministers and central bankers representing the Group of Seven industrialized nations, meeting Saturday in Bonn, went out of their way to avoid publicly commenting on exchange rates, thus tacitly approving a strengthening of the U.S. dollar, analysts said. Global blue chips, which see much of their revenue in dollars, rose. Australian stocks open mixed Australian stocks started Monday mixed despite a mildly positive U.S. lead, as investors took some profits from Friday's rally and as heavyweight retailers were dumped. The All Ordinaries index shed 0.5 points to 2,923.8 by 10:15 a.m. after rallying 1.45 percent on Friday. The turnover of A$867 million was inflated by 84.2 million shares in retailer Coles Myer, a 7.3 percent stake worth A$705.6 million, sold over the weekend by J.B. Were & Son on behalf of Solomon Lew and family at a 75 cent market discount. "Coles Myer was obviously going to be down after Solomon Lew dumped his shares ... and Woolworths figures weren't all that brilliant," dealer Peter Struk of Reynolds & Co. said. "It was significantly oversubscribed," a J.B. Were official said, adding the stock had gone to a wide spread of institutions. Coles Myer shares fell 47 cents to A$8.66 early. "It was a big surprise to the market," Struk said about the Coles Myer sale, adding investors appeared to have panicked despite the successful placement. A flurry of corporate results also had to be digested in early trade. First out was retailer Woolworths, showing as marginal net profit rise to A$178 for the six months to December 31, while the company warned short-term profit was likely to remain flat. Woolworths dipped 25 cents to A$5.30 on the news. C&W Optus rose 2 cents to A$3.52 after reporting a net loss of A$66.3 million in the first half of 1998/99 after abnormal losses relating millennium costs and early payment of an interest penalty. Still, the telecom said it was on track to achieve its full-year forecast of A$115 million in net profit.