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Technology Stocks : Compaq -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Elwood P. Dowd who wrote (50982)	3/2/1999 9:27:00 AM
From: rupert1	Respond to of 97611

Briefinng. com Tech Stocks for today: __________________________________________ Updated for 02-Mar-99 Please note: Briefing.com is provided as an information service only. Charter Media, Inc. and Briefing.com do not make specific trading recommendations or provide individualized investment advice. Readers should make investment decisions based on thorough research and their own investment criteria. See Disclaimer. General Commentary: Led by solid gains in the Internet group and by select gains in the disk-drive and chip equipment sectors, techs staged a mild comeback on Monday... But as has been the case for last couple of weeks, rally lacked conviction as volume totals were light and breadth figures unimpressive... Earnings, rates and valuations - three concerns that didn't disappear overnight... While we could see further upticks in early trading today, as early birds do some premature bargain hunting, Briefing.com maintains that correction has yet to run its course. Outlook in the PC sector won't be enhanced by Micron Electronics' (MUEI 14 7/16 +1/16) earnings warning... After the close, MUEI announced that Q2 sales and earnings would be below Q1 levels... Sales expected to drop sequentially by between 6% and 9%... Street had expected company to gain $0.14 in Q2 v. $0.12 in Q1... Company cited weaker than expected PC demand. Industry Briefs Computer Systems & Peripherals \| Networking \| Software \| Internet \| Semiconductor \| Chip Equipment \| Telecom Equipment Computer Systems & Peripherals Seeking to unleash the value of its DLT and storage businesses, Quantum (QNTM 19 9/16 +3 1/8) announced that it seeks shareholder approval to replace current shares with tracking stock that will reflect more accurately the separate performance of the company's DLT & storage systems anmd hard disk drive groups... Briefing.com applauds bold initiative to enhance shareholder value... Look for QNTM to retest 25 area over next few months. Box builders remained on the defensive amid growing concern of a slowdown in demand... Compaq (CPQ 33 3/8 -2) hit hard after it announced that it was cutting prices on corporate PCs by as much as 11%... Salomon Smith Barnmey also cut its Q1 estimate to $0.30 from $0.34 citing the drop in value of CPQ's operating assets in Brazil due to real's weakness... Other losers included Apple (AAPL 33 3/4 -1 1/16), IBM (IBM 168 3/8 - 1 3/8) and Gateway (GTW 71 -1 11/16)... Latter stock fell despite being upped to a buy from a hold by Nationsbanc Montgomery Securities. Value investors jumped back in disk-drive/storage stocks... Group thankful that February is over... Hutchinson (HTCH 37 3/8 +6 1/4) and Read-Rite (RDRT 9 13/16 +1 5/16) among the biggest winners. Lehman cut earnings estimate on Sun Microsystems (SUNW 97 1/4 -1/16), Hewlett-Packard (HWP 65 15/16 - 1/2) and IBM (IBM) by a nickel each due to Y2K concerns. Computer Networking 3Com (COMS 30 11/16 -3/4) remains victimized by earnings concerns... Monday it was CS First Boston that expressed concern that promotional and discount activity during last few weeks of quarter could jeopardize COMS's ability to meet estimates... That said, company left its estimate in the $0.30 to $0.34 area though it noted growing lack of confidence in its numbers... Street looking for gain of $0.36. Cisco (CSCO 99 7/16 +1 5/8) Would expect CSCO to do well in day when techs bounced back, but don't get too excited by gain as volume was light... Like most of the biug cap leaders, CSCO needs to spend more time backing and filling before it will be positioned for sustained recovery. Computer Software & Services Relatively quiet news day didn't stop bargain hunters from pecking away at the software group... Gains led by Concord Communications (CCRD 58 1/4 +1 5/8), BMC Software (BMCS 43 1/2 +2 5/8), and Macromedia (MACR 31 11/16 +1 1/8)... Meanwhile, Intuit (INTU 96 1/2 -2 7/16) gave ground after posting big gain in response to better than expected earnings... Pullback relatively modest in scope, suggesting that stock won't waste much time before pushing back above 100. BAAN (BAANF 9 1/4 - 3/16) due to report earnings today... Street looking for loss of $0.23... Company also noted last week that it will take additional steps to cut costs including more lay-offs. Internet As we expected, eBay (EBAY 332 -11) retreated on news that the federal government is investigating it for possible illegal transactions... Helping to soften the blow is fact that stock splits 3-for-1 after the close. Preview Travel (PTVL 23 +2 5/8) posted sizable gain on moderate jump in volume after announcing six-figure ad deals with 5 firms. CNet (CNET 130 11/16 +16 1/16) stock riding the stock split wave... Due to split on 3/8. Yahoo! (YHOO 160 1/8 +6 5/8) up ahead of analyst meeting late this week... Stock also attracting "bargain" hunters... CMG Information Services (CMGI 133 3/8 +10 3/4) signed a letter of intent to purchase Internet Profilers Corp., a provider of Web traffic verification, analysis and research solutions... Terms of deal were unavailable. Semiconductor Intel (INTC 117 1/16 -2 7/8) took a beating as Street lowered estimates on expectations of slower PC demand and ongoing price war with Advanced Micro Devices... Intel's announcement that it was cutting price of Pentium II chips to pave way for Pentium III, just added fuel to the fire... DLJ cut FY99 and FY00 estimates by $0.15 each to $4.50 and $5.30... Also lowered price target to 160 from 175... Sees downside risk to 100 area. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD 18 5/16 +7/16) scored another minor victory in its fight with Intel, as company announced that Toshiba would use its K6-2 chips in the Toshiba Satellite 2545 series of notebook computers. Broadcom (BRCM 60 15/16) could come under some fire down the road as Conexant Systems (CNXT 17 1/2 +1/2) announced that it has developed a programmable chip that could cut cable modem costs nearly in half... CNXT is chip unit spun off by Rockwell Systems... Break of 19 would leave stock free and clear for run to mid-20s. Semiconductor Equipment Group staged mild recovery try after getting hammered late last week as jump in rates triggered widespread profit-taking... Buyers took cue from Morgan Stanley which noted that sell-off was overdone... Especially in KLA-Tencor (KLAC 53 15/16 +2). Not everyone quick to jump back on the bandwagon... Salomon Smith Barney maintained its bullish outlook on Applied Materials (AMAT 57 1/16 +1 7/16), KLA-Tencor (KLAC) and Electro Scientific (ESIO 39 1/4 +2 11/16) but cut ratings on Silicon Valley Group (SVGI 12 1/2 -13/16), Credence Systems (CMOS 19 11/16 -1 7/16) and Asyst (ASYT19 -2 1/2). Watkins-Johnson's (WJ 25 3/4 +3 1/8) Board will pursue sale of company. Briefing.com holds to view that it is too soon to buy the dip. Telecommunications Equipment ADC Telecom (ADCT 39 15/16 -9/16) won a $4mln contract with Sistemas Cablevision of Venezuela. At Home (ATHM 107 1/8 +1) CEO said he expects access prices for online services to trend toward zero with ads and other content more fully covering costs. Ciena (CIEN 26 13/16 -1 1/16) gave ground in light profit-taking... Volume less than half of 10-day average.