eBay Posts Blow-Out Earnings

eBay posted strong earnings after the bell on Thursday, joining a string of technology companies trading higher after hours on good earnings news, including Microsoft and Nortel Networks.

Stocks rose during the day, buoyed by strong earnings from Check Point Software and IBM. Rumors of another Fed rate cut in the wake of the California utility crisis also boosted stocks.

The ISDEX http://www.wsrn.com/apps/ISDEX/ rose 4 to 411, and the Nasdaq climbed 85 to 2768. The S&P 500 added 18 to 1347, and the Dow rose 93 to 10,678, boosted by IBM's earnings. Volume declined to 1.3 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.5 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by 16 to 12 on the NYSE, and 21 to 17 on the Nasdaq. Economic reports continued to show a significant slowdown in manufacturing. For earnings reports, visit our earnings calendar at http://www.wsrn.com/apps/earnings/internet.xpl and reported earnings at http://www.wsrn.com/apps/earnings/ireported.xpl. For after hours quotes and news, visit our after hours trading site at http://www.afterhourstrading.com.

eBay soared 7 to 50 after posting earnings of 9 cents a share, 2 cents better than estimates. Microsoft , Commerce One , and Nortel all traded higher after hours on good earnings news. Sun Microsystems traded slightly lower after coming in light on revenues, and Critical Path plunged 15 points to 10 after missing estimates.

During the day, Check Point soared 11 7/16 to 138 after beating estimates by 8 cents with 46-cent earnings and declaring a 3-for-2 stock split.

i2 Technologies beat estimates by a penny with 9-cent earnings, but the stock fell 2 7/8 to 51 on concern about competition from the likes of Oracle and comments that business could slow .

Travelocity.com surged 4 3/8 to 19 5/16 after beating estimates by 9 cents with a 5-cent loss. Expedia rose 2 1/4 to 14.

Vignette plunged 4 3/4 to 7 3/4 on an earnings warning. BroadVision fell 2 1/4 to 15, and Art Technology lost 4 1/2 to 20 3/8.

Other earnings warnings came from Scient , down 7/16 to 3, S1 , off 1 1/4 to 6 1/2, Entrust , down 3/4 to 16 5/8, and Jupiter Media Metrix , down 1 1/16 to 7 3/8.

Mercury Interactive surged 8 1/8 to 89 1/16 after beating estimates by 4 cents with 28-cent earnings. Marimba , up 25/32 to 7 29/32, beat estimates by 6 cents with a 1-cent loss.

Analysts dismissed yesterday's speculation that Yahoo could be a takeover target, but traders didn't appear to be listening, sending the stock 4 1/8 higher to 34 3/8.

Openwave continued to rise on positive analyst comments, climbing 2 1/4 to 49 3/8, but off its intraday high of 53 1/4.

Networkers had a tough time despite positive earnings from Redback Networks , down 7 11/16 to 40 7/8, Extreme Networks , down 5 1/2 to 42 3/8, Avici , off 1 to 33 15/16, and Efficient Networks , off 15/16 to 13 1/2.

NBC Internet slipped 3/16 to 4 after announcing 30% layoffs.

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