Microsoft Corp. today announced the two-year anniversary of the StockScouter stock-rating system, featured on the CNBC on MSN® Money online personal finance service (http://money.msn.com/). Since its inception in July 2001, the StockScouter benchmark portfolio* has outperformed the S&P 500 by 56.75 percentage points. Using a quantitative methodology, the popular StockScouter system enables investors to quickly and objectively assess a stock's potential for outperforming the broader market within a six- to 12-month period.

Microsoft also announced that MSN Money columnist and key StockScouter contributor Jon Markman has won a 2003 Gerald Loeb Award for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism in the "News Services and Online Content" category. The Loeb Awards, administered by the Anderson School at the University of California at Los Angeles, are considered the most prestigious awards in business journalism and honor those who make significant contributions to the understanding of business, finance and the economy.

CNBC on MSN Money, with its unique combination of award-winning editorial content, powerful tools and services, attracted the largest audience from home to work among financial news and information Web sites in March, April and May, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. Traffic to the site has grown 55 percent from May 2002 to May 2003.

StockScouter was developed in conjunction with Camelback Research Alliance Inc. (http://www.camelbackresearch.com/index.jsp), an independent research firm at the cutting edge of financial engineering for institutional money managers. The powerful stock-rating tool analyzes and ranks return expectations on approximately 6,000 stocks.