MARKET PREVIEW: Techs cheer over Cisco earnings

Good news from Cisco should spark tech enthusiasm Wednesday, though a spate of hacker attacks that crippled Ebay, Buy.com, and Amazon could dampen the mood. Asian markets were mixed, Europe moved up, and the Dow is set to open slightly higher.

U.S.

Cisco Systems (Nasdaq: CSCO) reported better-than-expected earnings and revenue in the fiscal second quarter, along with a two-for-one stock split. Stock in the telecommunications equipment provider was up to 135 on Instinet after Tuesday's close of 125 13/16 on Nasdaq. But the attacks on leading web sites, following Monday's problems at Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO) drew more attention.

Hackers shut down some the sites Tuesday night by overwhelming them with false traffic. Hackers attacked Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN), eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY), CNN.com, owned by Time Warner,(NYSE: TWX), and Buy.com (Nasdaq: BUYX), just as it was launching its IPO.

Most of the sites were able to get back online within a couple of hours, and stocks appeared unaffected by the blows. Buy.com fared reasonably in its IPO, closing up 93 percent to 25 1/8, Amazon shares gained 7/16 to 83 9/16 in after-hours trading, and eBay shares were unchanged at 169-3/4.

Wedensday's IPOs include email interaction software firm, Delano Technology, (Nasdaq: DTEC) priced its IPO at $18, above the revised range, to trade Wednesday. Hospital automation software vendor, Landacorp (Nasdaq: LCOR), priced its IPO at $10, the top of the range and Vicinity (Nasdaq: VCNT), a provider of Internet-based promotion services to brands and bricks-and-mortar retail stores, designed to improve walk-through traffic, priced 7 million shares at $17.

Expect the following technology stocks to be among Wednesday's most actively traded issues: Allegiance Telecom, Cisco Systems, Commerce One and Ebay.

Strong economic data suggesting inflation remains in check helped spark another rally on Wall Street Tuesday as the Nasdaq composite shot up 105 points to close at another record high of 4,427.12.

At the Bell

The Dow Jones industrial average may open about 50 points higher. The Standard & Poor's 500 index for June futures contracts was up 6.6 points to 1452 at 7:41 a.m. EST in 24-hour electronic trading.

The Inter@ctive Week @Net Index was up 10 to 566.44.

Asia

Trading in Asia was mixed. The Nikkei 225 rose 0.70 percent to 20,007, Singapore's Strait Times index slipped 0.82 percent to 2,227 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 3.64 percent to 16,819.

Europe

European markets were moving up. London's FTSE 100 rose 1.88 percent to 6,403. The CAC 40 in Paris gained 0.98 percent to 6,359 and the Xetra DAX in Frankfurt was up 1.56 percent to 7,667 at 7:11 a.m. EST.

Reuters contributed to this report.