(FORTUNE Magazine) – FREEING A MICROSOFT SLAVE

Being a billionaire can be such a burden. Just look at Paul Allen, who's sitting on $12 billion of Microsoft shares but can't unload a big chunk for fear of sending the stock into a tailspin. How is he ever going to do justice to all his varied interests (tech startups, major-league sports franchises, electric guitars, etc.)? Enter the masters of the universe: Investment bankers have approached Allen with a novel plan to make his holdings more liquid by securitizing them, creating a derivative backed by the Microsoft stock.

Allen's response: No thank you, fellas. But just think of the possibilities: Say goodbye to those vanity license plates; now you can have your very own derivative--the ultimate status symbol of the truly successful....

On another corner of Wall Street, there are some thinly veiled accusations being flung toward Allen's buddy Bill Gates: "We believe MSFT management wants its shares to decline," Morgan Stanley Dean Witter analyst Mary Meeker wrote recently. Wouldn't that, uh, contradict management's fiduciary duty to shareholders? Meeker explains by E-mail: "MSFT is a heavy user of stock options as an employee compensation tool and...Microsoft would prefer that its shares have a slow and steady rise, [which] helps keep employees focused on creating great products instead of buying Porsches! Also, owing to its large stock-option plan, MSFT must buy back stock in the open market, and just like Joe Investor, it wants to buy the shares as cheaply as possible."

Or maybe Gates & Co. just want pros like Meeker to keep their expectations low--so the company can exceed them. --Andrew E. Serwer

TENDING THE TILL

Here's an odd spot to ring up some value: NCR, the computer hardware outfit spun off from AT&T on Jan. 1. Compared with fellow AT&T offspring Lucent Technologies, NCR has been a dog. But Don Parker of Emerald Partners in New York sees potential: "I'm hoping it's going to be another IBM-like turnaround." NCR has shed its PC biz, focusing on its market-leading position in cash registers, retail inventory systems, and bar-code readers. It's also a major player in automated teller machines. True, costs are still sky-high (the company remains in the red), but Parker is impressed with CEO Lars Nyberg's plan to slim down. "The company has $7 billion in sales but a market cap of only $3.6 billion, plus it has $1 billion in net cash," says Parker, who admits it may take a couple of years for a rebound to materialize. There must be other believers: NCR's stock has climbed from $28 a share to $36 since mid-July. --A.E.S.

IT'S NEVER TOO LATE...

Don't you hate it when a hot stock takes off without you? Look at biotech outfit Immunex, which has gone from the low teens to $67 in the past year because of highly encouraging trials for rheumatoid-arthritis drug Enbrel. But wait: Analyst Alex To of Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette claims that this time it's still plenty early to buy in. The market hasn't recognized Enbrel's billion-dollar potential, he argues, which should catapult Immunex from the ranks of biotech "hope" stocks into the field of legitimate growth companies. He figures Immunex should nearly double again in the next year. Stay tuned. --A.E.S.

REPORTER ASSOCIATE Jeanne Lee