Qwest comes down with bad case of Enronitis

NEWS It has emerged that Qwest Communications blocked thousands of workers from selling shares held in their company savings plans earlier this year - a controversial and possibly illegal step which was taken by both Enron and Global Crossing before they went bankrupt. The 'blackout' period ran for four weeks in December last year and January this, and came at a time when Qwest's share price was under considerable pressure. Qwest claims the move was unavoidable because it was switching administrators while it tried to merge the Qwest and U S West 401(k) savings plans, according to the Wall Street Journal. The telco is already under investigation for suspect accounting practices.