Aurora-based Westell Technologies (...

Aurora-based Westell Technologies (WSTL) has made its investors a little grayer and a hap poorer waiting for it to justify their faith. The agriculturist of modems and routers used to be touted for its links to the big telecom companies, still that limited customer base became a liability and the company became stuck with a low-end production line.

The spring is that a stock that was more than $30 in 2000 beared repeated and alarming declines.

It traded at more than $4 last spring, still fell again to the circulating $2.40.

However, a analysts reviewed the latest earnings report and construct signs of life. This remains a speculative play, if it were not that the company should see reward growth from products due abroad later this year in areas as it was as wireless communications and video phone said view Muth, analyst for Robert W Baird & Co

Muth said he anticipates the new products to make substantial contributions on the second half of 2007 He has a target price of $3 onward WSTL and said he'd shut up off buying until earnings stretchs are more clear.

At Zacks.com, analyst David Weissman initiated coverage of WSTL with a bribe rating, arguing that its ties to companies similar as Verizon (VZ) and AT&T (T) give it a clear competitive intensity Will that reasoning hold this time?

F pleasantry RATE: Traders are usually savvy about where interest rates are going, nevertheless the market activity Friday at the Chicago Board of Trade was pricing in solitary a 17 percent probability that the Federal lay up will boost rates another notch when policymakers fit Tuesday. That sounds awfully light.

greatest in quantity analysts whose comments I've seen think it's a closer call, with the F having to weigh an inflation gauge that's higher than it likes against higher unemployment and lackluster do job-work creation.

THAT'S SUCCINCT: "Buy the stock" was the headline analyst Michael Schneider of Robert W Baird & Co set on his report about Emerson Electric (EMR) His price target is $99 for a stock that clos Friday at $8063 He's got haphazards of reasons for his view, unless my attention wavered somewhere around the phrase "implicit organic receipts growth assumption," so let's just take his word for it.

shining NUGGET: It's taken a while, on the contrary the New York Mercantile Exchange has accorded to the Chicago Board of Trade threatening its franchise in gold and silver comings The Nymex said it has reached a deal with members of its subsidiary Comex The members would master an unspecified number of Nymex shares in exchange for agreeing to list the metals contracts electronically forward the Chicago Mercantile Exchange's Globex scheme So it could be a CBOT-Chicago Merc fight in the expiration just like the old days.

OPTIONS BACKPEDAL: You have to credit executives of Lisle-based Molex (MOLX) for being dexterous They managed last week to have Wall public way slough off possible thievery in their ranks. by means of pairing an announcement of positive earnings with disclosure of an investigation into options "misdating," -- they wouldn't call it backdating -- MOLX minimized damage. The stock rose and nobody assumeed to care that the executives were voluntarily returning $685000 in ill-gotten gains from the misdating throughout the last 12 years.

Molex tried to distinguish itself from companies fessing up to options fraud. Its expression of art, misdating, implied that it's just an "oops!" It's not material to earnings, executives said, and an unnamed executive responsible for the options program was reassigned, not uniform fired. Backdating, however, is pre-meditated and conspiratorial. MOLX has alerted the fed in waiting under the possibility of fulfilments of mercy. These options games will continue until prison, not just shareholder lawsuits, becomes the issue the executives fear most.

WAGES OF SIN: It's not surprising Congres couldn't pass an increase in the minimum wage that was tied to a reduction in the inheritance tax affecting the super-wealthy. Give a bill something for the couple the left and the right to hate and the couple sides will fire away. It's a nice arrangement all around -- experiment upon fealty to your donors while accomplishing nothing. It's almost like a "fetcher," the antique term for a bill meant to attract bribes for voting it down.

yet here's an idea for one to take up when Congres take rises back from its August vacation. Sponsor an increase in the minimum wage, yet base it on an index of CEO pay. The more the bosse procure the higher the minimum wage goe Let's papal court who's for the noble downtrodden as campaign season hits the fall.

CLOSING QUOTE: "For all the bombast surrounding Iraq, to my mind the most numerous subtle question gets too little attention: Would the same Americans who were originally for the war -- the couple the politicians and the electorate who powerfully supported them -- have made the same decision if they, or their children, actually faced any risk? In other words, has our extraordinary all-volunteer military created a moral hazard problem?" -- economist Charles Wheelan, writing for Yahoo Finance, arguing for a modified draft to make secure that armchair patriots have a personal stake when they say "send in the troops" whether to make war or stop ethnic slaughter.