More good news for those of Intel's 3,200 Irish employees who own shares in the company. Hot on the heels of higher-than-expected fourth quarter results and the news that employees were getting almost three week's pay as a bonus comes news of a stock split.

The move by the world's biggest chip-maker follows stock splits by fellow technology giants Microsoft and IBM and online service company American Online.

As well as splitting the shares on a two-for-one basis, Intel has announced it is raising its quarterly dividend from two US cents per share to three cents. The dividend will be paid on June 1st, after the stock split which will take place in April. Shareholders will be entitled to one additional share of common stock for each share held on March 23rd.

Meanwhile, investors in Internet stocks should pay close attention to the recent warnings from Mr Alan Greenspan, chairman of the US Federal Reserve. He described the recent rapid rise in Net-related stock prices as akin to the popular appeal of a lottery and warned that most of the companies were likely to fail.