PeopleSoft shares on the rise

Shares of PeopleSoft Inc. (Nasdaq: PSFT) moved up 1 9/16, or 10 percent, to 16 11/16 Thursday after rolling out its latest business-to-business software product. PeopleSoft shares had lost more than half their value in the past three months.

The Pleasanton, Calif.-based software developer debuted its PeopleSoft eMarketplace software, which allows user to deploy Internet sites for e-commerce transactions.

PeopleSoft, once one of Wall Street's hottest enterprise software stories, has suffered from declining sales in the past few quarters as companies shift their resources toward Y2K issues.

Last quarter, PeopleSoft slipped past reduced first-quarter estimates.

The stock peaked at 52 1/8 in July before collapsing to a low of 11 5/8 in April.

SAP (NYSE: SAP), the world's largest enterprise software developer, inched up 1/16 to 36 5/16 Thursday after Lehman Brothers upgraded the stock from a "neutral" recommendation to "buy."

Among other software stocks, Oracle Corp. (Nasdaq: ORCL) gained 3/16 to 26 9/16 and Network Associates Inc. (Nasdaq: NETA) fell 9/16 to 15 7/8.

Nineteen of the 23 analysts following PeopleSoft rate the stock a "hold."

First Call consensus expects it to earn 3 cents a share in its second quarter and 18 cents a share in the fiscal year.