Cisco reported another solid quarter late Tuesday, beating Wall Street estimates and raising guidance.
Cisco’s earnings of 33 cents a share beat estimates by two cents, and sales rose 27% to $8.4 billion, also ahead of Thomson Financial forecasts. CEO John Chambers said he expects 19-20% sales growth in the current quarter, ahead of 17% estimates, and he said he expects next quarter to be strong too.
“Momentum remains strong,” Chambers said on the company’s conference call.
In a statement, Chambers said that Cisco’s “unique ability to balance between strategy and innovation … has positioned Cisco to take advantage of key emerging business and IT trends such as the rise of video on the network. As the network becomes the platform, we are seeing more and more signs that all forms of IT and communication are moving into the network and increasing the total available market to Cisco.”
Advanced technologies and emerging markets were just two of the standouts in what Chambers said was a balanced quarter, although Scientific-Atlanta’s 21% sales growth was a little light of estimates and enterprise sales lagged. Cisco’s standalone revenue growth was 18% after Scientific-Atlanta’s contribution was factored out.
Cisco shares jumped 4% in late trading on the news, coming within 2% of a multi-year high.
Stocks were mixed during the day, as a warning from National Semi weighed on chip stocks.
CDC , Nuance
, Benchmark Electronics
and Echelon
gained on their earnings reports.
IAC InterActiveCorp , Art Technology
, EarthLink
, Sohu
and Gartner
lost ground on their results.
Nortel fell 2% on the departure of the company’s CFO.
The Nasdaq added 1 to 2471, the S&P 500 gained 1 to 1448, and the Dow added 4 to 12,666. Volume rose to 2.56 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.22 billion on the Nasdaq. Decliners led 20-12 on the NYSE, and 16-13 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 56% on the NYSE, and 43% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 361-20 on the NYSE, and 157-51 on the Nasdaq.