Tag Archives: msft

Fitbit Beats Q1 Targets, But Disappoints On Q2 EPS Outlook

Fitbit ( FIT ) late Wednesday smashed Wall Street’s targets for the first quarter, but delivered mixed guidance for the current quarter that disappointed investors. Fitbit stock plunged as much as nearly 12% in after-hours trading following the earnings news release. In Wednesday’s regular session, Fitbit stock dipped a fraction, to 17.10. Fitbit made its IPO last June, pricing shares at 20. The maker of wearable fitness devices earned 10 cents a share excluding items on sales of $505.4 million. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected 3 cents and $444.3 million. On a year-over-year basis, Q1 sales rose 50%. But that’s down from 92% growth in Q4, 168% in Q3 and 253% in Q2. Q1 earnings per share dropped 63% from 27 cents in the year-earlier period. For the current quarter, Fitbit is projecting earnings per share of 8 to 11 cents excluding items on sales of $565 million to $585 million, or $575 million at the midpoint. Wall Street had been modeling for Fitbit to earn 26 cents a share, up 24%, on sales of $531.3 million, up 33%. For the year, Fitbit expects non-GAAP EPS of $1.12 to $1.24 on sales of $2.5 billion to $2.6 billion. Analysts on average were looking for 2016 EPS of $1.13 on sales of $2.46 billion. Fitbit competes in the health-and-fitness wearables market with Apple ( AAPL ), Garmin ( GRMN ), Microsoft ( MSFT ), Under Armour ( UA ) and others. Last week, Fitbit announced a distribution deal Chinese e-commerce website Tmall.com , a unit of Alibaba Group ( BABA ), that could bolster its prospects in China.

Zendesk Gains Traction In Enterprise As Q1 Revenue Beats

Zendesk ( Z ) stock jumped after the provider of customer-support software to retailers reported a smaller-than-expected Q1 loss and raised its full-year 2016 revenue guidance. Zendesk stock was up more than 8% in early trading in the stock market today , near 25, and breaking out of a cup-with-handle base at a 23.87 buy point in heavy volume. San Francisco-based Zendesk said it lost 8 cents per share minus items, vs. analysts’ estimate of a 10-cent per-share loss. Revenue rose 62% to $68.5 million, topping views of $66 million. “Zendesk finished Q4 with over 75,600 customer accounts, up from 69,000 last quarter, representing a record 6,600 customer additions,” said Pacific Crest analyst Brendan Barnicle in a research report late Tuesday. “As a result, customer acquisition costs and return on acquisition costs improved in Q1 over Q4.” For 2016, Zendesk forecast revenue  of $302.5 million at the midpoint of its guidance range, which would be up 45%, and is $7.5 million above its earlier guidance of $295 million. Zendesk provides a cloud-based customer service software platform. In November, it announced a partnership with Microsoft ( MSFT ). Zendesk competes with Salesforce.com ( CRM ), Freshdesk and Desk.com. Zendesk is gaining traction in the enterprise market, says Bhavan Suri, an analyst at William Blair. “Zendesk signed 50% more deals with average contract value of more than $50,000, and the average deal size for these transactions increased 30% year-over-year — a clear indication of the company’s success in the enterprise market,” Suri wrote in a research report. However, Zendesk has only a so-so IBD Composite Rating of 64 out of a possible 99. IBD’s Computer-Software Enterprise group ranks just No. 126 out of 197 groups. Zendesk’s stock had plunged on Feb. 5 amid a broad sell-off in tech stocks amid concern over China’s slowdown, tech spending and falling oil prices.