offering this week, entering a new issues market which has substantially cooled since the heady days of 1999.

AGC, a subsidiary of Global Crossing Ltd., is one of several offerings this week which have piqued the interest of Hoover's Online money editor Kenan Pollack.

Others include fibreoptic equipment company Oplink Communications Inc., online learning company Element K Corp. and leather company Coach Inc. "The market meltdown in April was the line in the sand,'' he told Reuters last week. "Up until then you banked on euphoria driving your IPO. People now want to see hard numbers, they want to see real financials.'' "Investors have come back down to earth,'' Pollack said. "We have seen very dramatic returns, but they were not anywhere near where they were a year and a half ago. In some ways there is a kind of pragmatic realism that has come back to the market and it's healthy.''