AOL Leads Market Rally

America Online Tuesday announced several key partnerships, leading a boost in the Internet sector.

At midday, internet.com’s Internet Stock Index was up 29.34, or 5.2 percent to 594.29. The Nasdaq Composite was up 45.86 to 2786.88 and the Dow Jones industrial average gained 91.18 to 11230.42 — both were in record territory.

America Online (AOL) climbed 8 3/8 to 123 5/8 on news of its four-year, $89 million deal with recent IPO drkoop.com (KOOP). AOL will roll out drkoop.com content across its five brands by
this fall and receive performance-based warrants to purchase shares in the medical information company.
The alliance also drove KOOP up 13 to 36 5/8 in midday trading.

Autoweb.com (AWEB) and Critical Path (CPTH) both rose on news of alliances with AOL. Autoweb Tuesday signed a two-year advertising agreement with AOL to bring the online auto dealer’s services to the AOL Network, sending its stock up 3 5/32 to 17 9/16. Critical Path inked a deal to provide e-mail service to AOL’s CompuServe property, climbing 3/18 to 52 5/8.

Another Internet megasite, Yahoo (YHOO), helped spur the tech rally as it rose midday 9 to 187 1/8 on speculation of its Q2 earnings, set to be released Wednesday. Yahoo is expected to beat Street estimates by eight cents a share.