RIM confirms BlackBerry e-mail problems working again

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Blackberry maker RIM issued a statement at 0550 BST which said all services were now "operating normally". RIM, based in Waterloo, Ontario, gave no details on what caused the problem. It said email service was "delayed or intermittent," but phone calls were not disrupted.

The market sold the stock, then bought it back. But at least one analyst pondered if RIM's infrastructure could keep up with the torrid pace of its subscriber growth.

RIM has about 8 million subscribers who use various models of its ubiquitous BlackBerry, and the United States is its biggest market.

Millions of Blackberry users were left without email, web browsing and messaging services following the crash around 1100 BST on 10 October.

Chris Green, a technology analyst with the Davies Murphy Group, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the glitch is "yet another public failure" for Canadian company RIM. RIM's often-volatile shares, which regularly lose or gain between 1 and 3 percent in a session, were up $2.54 at $133.81 on Nasdaq, recovering from a drop soon after the market opened. On the Toronto Stock Exchange, they rose C$2.08 to C$150.90.

RIM, a stock market darling which has won rave reviews for its device lineup, added 1.02 million BlackBerry subscribers in the fourth quarter alone, and expects to add another 1.125 million to 1.15 million in the quarter to June 2.

But there have been stumbles too, and RIM said this month it is now facing a formal investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over historical stock-option grants. The SEC earlier had been conducting an informal inquiry.