NIKKEI 225	AUSTRALIA ASX200	SHANGHAI	HANG SENG

KOSPI	VIX	GOLD	NYMEX CRUDE

This morning's broker recs:

AAL Morgan Stanley: reiterated equalweight, tp raised to 1315 from 1235
ANTO Morgan Stanley: cut to equalweight
BARC JP Morgan[HB]: underweight, tp raised to 115 from 114
BG. Goldman Sachs: reiterated neutral, tp raised to 1350 from 1150
BLT Morgan Stanley: cut to underweight
BP. Goldman Sachs: downgraded to sell from neutral, tp cut to 560 from 650
BP. Morgan Stanley: cut to underweight
BT.A Goldman Sachs: downgraded to sell from neutral
CNE Goldman Sachs: reiterated buy, tp cut to 2663 from 3062
DEB Citigroup: upgraded to buy from hold, tp raised to 70 from 45
ENRC Morgan Stanley: reiterated overweight, tp raised to 580 from 575
HSBA BOCI: cut to hold from buy, tp cut to HK$38 from HK$46
KAZ Morgan Stanley: reiterated equalweight, tp raised to 380 from 375
LLOY JP Morgan: underweight, tp cut to 14 from 67
LMI Morgan Stanley: reiterated underweight, tp raised to 665 from 525
NWG BofA: upgraded to neutral from underperform, tp cut to 220 from 240
PMO Goldman Sachs: reiterated neutral, tp cut to 128 from 1348
PNN BofA[HB]: upgraded to neutral from underperform, tp cut to 430 from 470
RBS JP Morgan: underweight, tp cut to 17 from 25
SIA Goldman Sachs: reiterated neutral, tp cut to 1283 from 1348
SMDR Goldman Sachs: reiterated buy, tp cut to 229 from 255
SVT BofA: tp cut to 1160 from 1300
TCG Morgan Stanley: downgraded to equalweight from overweight
TLW Goldman Sachs: reiterated neutral, tp cut to 949 from 1051
UU. BofA: tp cut to 450 from 500
VOD Goldman Sachs: upgraded to conviction buy
VOD Morgan Stanley: up to overweight, tp 175

Midday Market Overview

        APRIL'S FOOL DAY

April Fool's Day computer virus is activated...
but fails to cause internet chaos

A computer virus that has wormed its way into millions of PCs
was activated today... but with little effect.

The Conficker virus, which has infected up to 15million computers
since last autumn, has so far lurked harmlessly - but experts were
braced for it to change the way it operated first thing this morning.

The 'worm' started looking for new instructions on what it should do
next by scanning 50,000 different websites at midnight last night.

Experts feared the virus was about to be used by its creators to
control an army' of 15 million 'zombie PCs' to steal bank details,
send spam emails or even crash a major website.
But so far, nothing untoward has taken place.

'Conficker has activated,' said Patrik Runald, chief security adviser at F-Secure.
'So far nothing has actually happened.'

He said the Conficker creators were unlikely to strike on a day when so much attention was directed on the virus.

'These guys have been pretty smart until now - the worm is unfortunately very well done,' Mr Runald said.
'So far they haven't been stupid. So why should they start on April 1?'
Conficker, which is also known as Downadup or Kido, is a 'worm' virus that exploits a gap in Microsoft Windows software. It affects computers through the internet and infected memory sticks.

Parliament, the Ministry of Defence and several NHS trusts have been infected, as well as home computers.

Botnets have been used in the past to generate millions of pieces of spam email and to blackmail websites by threatening to temporarily knock them out.
It would do this by simultaneously sending a massive numbers of search queries or generating millions of pieces of spam email to knock websites offline through the sheer weight of connections.
In a worst case scenario, some experts even believe that Conficker has been designed to create a so-called 'Dark Google' - a search engine for criminals which will allow them to look for data on any of the 10 million infected PCs and then sell it on.
Conficker is able to guess administrator passwords used by networks of computers and is able to disable anti-virus software once it has gained access to a system.
Today, Conficker is generating 50,000 domain names and systematically try to communicate with each one.

Whoever developed the virus will then just have to register one of these domain names in order to take control of the millions of zombie computers that have been created.
Mikko Hypponen, of antivirus software firm F-Secure, said: 'It is scary thinking about how much control a hacker could have. They would have access to millions of machines.'
Experts are sceptical about whether today is the day the worm will turn, but urge the public to ensure their anti-virus software is up to date.
Security patches can be downloaded from Microsoft, which has offered a 175,000 reward to find the culprits.

One sign of already being infected is being blocked from visiting the websites of anti-virus companies such as McAfee.
Graham Cluley, of internet security company Sophos, advises people to rid their machines of the worm as soon as they can.

He said: 'There is no reason to believe that there will be any instructions for Conficker to receive on 1 April,' he said. 'They could just as easily be delivered on 2 April, 4 April, 25 May or never.

'This network is large and the whole world is going to be watching everything it does.

'You could argue it is a victim of its own success because it is going to be difficult for it to do anything under the radar.'

Mikko Hypponen, of antivirus software firm F-Secure, said: 'It is scary thinking about how much control a hacker could have. They would have access to millions of machines.'
How do I know if my PC has been infected?
Conficker finds vulnerable computers and automatically disables security services and blocks access to anti-virus websites.
You might be infected if your internet connection is running particularly slowly.
Find out whether you already have Conficker by using Microsoft, Symantec or a McAfee security tool.

How do I stay safe?
Make sure your PC is running the latest version of anti-virus software such as Norton or McAfee.
Make sure any USB devices you use on your PC are from trusted sources - Conficker downloads files when an infected USB is used on a new PC

Update your PC with all the latest patches from Microsoft - available from Microsoft's website.
If your PC has been infected with the virus you can download Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool from the website. If the virus blocks this then ask a friend with an uninfected computer to download it and email it to you.

End-of-day Market Overview