Salesforce stock fell 4% in Tuesday’s regular session.
Stephen Lam/Getty Images
Salesforce.com
stock was losing ground after the cloud-based enterprise software company posted strong earnings. Mixed guidance apparently left some investors disappointed.
The company also announced that Bret Taylor, who has been president and chief operating officer, was promoted to co-chief executive officer with Marc Benioff and vice chair of the company’s board.
Taylor is having a big week: On Monday, he was named executive chairman at
Twitter
(ticker: TWTR) where founder and CEO Jack Dorsey is stepping down as an officer and director.
Salesforce stock (CRM) was down 6.2% to $267.25 in premarket trading Wednesday. That follows a decline of 4% on Tuesday.
“In a market where anything but clean ‘beat and raises’ are punished, we are not surprised to see CRM shares under some pressure,” writes Evercore ISI analyst Kirk Materne.
For the fiscal third quarter ended Oct. 31, Salesforce reported revenue of $6.86 billion, up 27% from a year ago or 26% adjusted for currency, and about in-line with estimates of $6.8 billion. On a non-GAAP basis, the company earned $1.27 a share, including a gain of 28 cents for mark-to-market accounting of strategic investments. Adjusted for the gain, the company edged the consensus of 92 cents a share. On a GAAP basis, the company earned 47 cents a share, including 27 cents from investment gains.
Remaining performance obligations at the end of the quarter were $36.3 billion, up 20% year over year.
“We delivered another phenomenal quarter, fueling strong revenue growth, margin and cash flow,” Benioff said. “With the tremendous strength of our Customer 360 platform and Slack, we’re on track to reach $50 billion revenue in FY ‘26.”
For the January quarter, Salesforce sees revenue of $7.224 billion to $7.234 billion, up 24% from a year ago, with non-GAAP profit of 72 to 73 cents a share. The Street has been projecting $7.22 billion in profit and 81 cents a share. The company projects a GAAP loss of 23 to 24 cents a share, wider than the Street consensus at a loss of 15 cents. The company sees growth in current remaining performance obligations of 19%.
For fiscal year 2022, Salesforce now sees revenue of $26.39 billion to $26.4 billion, up 24%, with non-GAAP profit of $4.68 to $4.69 a share; consensus has been $26.33 billion and $4.42 a share.
For the April quarter, Salesforce is projecting revenue of $7.215 billion to $7.25 billion, up 21% to 22%, which is below the Street consensus at $7.35 billion.
For fiscal year 2023, Salesforce sees revenue of $31.7 billion to $31.8 billion, up 20%, and in-line with the Street at $31.8 billion.
Salesforce also announced the addition of two new board members:
Williams-Sonoma
CEO Laura Alber and former
United Airlines
CEO Oscar Munoz.
Write to Eric J. Savitz at eric.savitz@barrons.com
