BUYBACK ANNOUNCEMENTS BRING MARKETS WAY BACK.

Byline: David E. Kalish Associated Press 

Some of America's biggest companies stepped up to buy billions of dollars in their own shares Tuesday, an expression of market confidence that helped spark an unprecedented turnaround on Wall Street.

The corporate actions, while grounded in profit motives rather than civic-mindedness, effectively achieved what the federal government sometimes attempts by adding reserves to the interest-rate markets: Preserving faith in the financial system.

International Business Machines Corp. was the first to step up, announcing it planned to buy back $3.5 billion worth of its stock just as the market was down more than 100 points in morning trading on top of Monday's 544-point plunge.

The announcement triggered a reversal in not only IBM's falling stock - sending it up $9.37-1/2 to $99.37-1/2 - it lifted the broader market as well.

Other companies jumped in with plans. The Knight-Ridder newspaper chain said it would buy back up to an additional 3 million of its shares, or 3.4 percent of its outstanding stock. Storage Technology Corp., a major software maker, followed suit. Intel Corp., the world's largest computer chip company, planned a buyback, the CNBC cable television station said, but Intel denied the report. Standex International Corp., a manufacturer, approved the buyback of an additional 1 million shares.

By day's end, the Dow Jones industrial average retraced more than half of its record 550-point plunge of Monday and posted its biggest point gain ever for a single day. The Dow rose 337.17 points to close at 7,498.32.

Analysts cited buybacks as a major factor.

``It certainly is helpful, and companies that are doing corporate buybacks certainly put a floor to how much risk is in the stock,'' said Gary Helmig, a financial analyst at Soundview Financial Corp.