MARKET CLOSE: Nasdaq makes afternoon recovery

A spate of afternoon buying lifted the Nasdaq out of its doldrums Thursday.

After spending most of the day below or barely above the previous day's close, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index ended Thursday up 67.26 to 4,617.59, thanks to a surge in the last 90 minutes of the trading session. Inter@ctive Week's @100 Index rose 40.74 to 6,252.72.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell to 10,092.63, down 133.10 for the day. The S&P 500 slid 7.26 to 1,353.43.

Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) stock went up 5 3/16 to 114 1/4. Robertson Stephens analyst Dan Niles raised his earnings estimates for Intel and boosted his price target on the stock to $150 from $125. Intel also announced the acquisition of Voice Technologies Group, a privately-held provider of communications technology.

The Nasdaq's newest member was among the most heavily traded stocks on U.S. markets Thursday. American depositary receipts of Carrier1 International (Nasdaq: CONE) more than doubled, advancing 17 1/2 to 34 1/2 following the company's initial public offering, which raised several hundred million. The Luxembourg-based telecom firm is building a high-capacity, low-cost cross-border fiber optic network in Europe.

Transaction Systems Architects (Nasdaq: TSAI) rose 12 1/8 to 39 7/8 after an analyst praised its plans to leverage its infrastructure business in the electronic payments business.

Electronic Arts (Nasdaq: ERTS) increased 2 11/16 to 91 1/8 after the game software company said it will buy multimedia developer DreamWorks Interactive.

On the earnings front, the continuing success of Safeguard Scientifics' (NYSE: SFE) spin-offs and investor subscription programs led the company to profit $2.09 a share in its fourth quarter. Shares fell 13/16 to 155 7/16.

Optical network components maker JDS Uniphase (Nasdaq: JDSU) gained 22 1/2 to 258 following a new "buy" rating from PaineWebber. Another brokerage firm, Lehman Bros., decided to sell Tellabs (Nasdaq: TLAB) stock and replace it with JDS Uniphase. Shares of Tellabs fell 2 1/8 to 51 11/16.

Shares of Cabletron Systems (NYSE: CS) picked up 6 9/16 to 42 9/16. The network hardware, software and services vendor said it received a $200 million investment from a private firm, Silver Lake Partners. Cisco Sytems (Nasdaq: CSCO) slid 1 3/8 to 137 1/4.

3Com (Nasdaq: COMS) rose 5 3/8 to 83. The company's Palm subsidiary unveiled prototypes using the Bluetooth wireless technology standard.

Research in Motion (Nasdaq: RIMM) advanced 24 to 142 1/4. The maker of interactive e-mail pagers announced a marketing and technology alliance with Nortel Networks (NYSE: NT) to develop next-generation wireless Internet services and computing devices for business and consumer markets. Nortel stock dropped 2 7/16 to 116 5/8.

Intuit (Nasdaq: INTU), slated to report quarterly results after the bell, was up 4 3/4 to 72 5/16. VA Linux Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: LNUX), also reporting, fell 2 3/8 to 124 3/4.

Qualcomm (Nasdaq: QCOM) shares slid 7 3/16 to 139 11/16 after The Wall Street Journal reported China has postponed deployment of a national wireless network based on Qualcomm's CDMA technology.

Hertz Technology Group (Nasdaq: HERZ) moved up 3 7/8 to 6 5/8. The company's RemoteIT subsidiary said it would offer DSL service with free inside wiring and set-up, a free DSL modem and 30 days of free usage. RemoteIT would charge $108.95 per month for business customers using a symmetrical 160 kb line.

Open Text (Nasdaq: OTEX) shot up 12 7/16 to 45 15/16. The company launched an online business-to-business marketplace.>