It’s hard to call a few quarters a major trend, but so far HP’s And HP’s strong results also suggest that the company may be the cause of at least some of Dell’s HP reported blow-out quarterly results after the close on Thursday, showing none of the weakness that has plagued rivals in recent months. HP’s pro forma earnings of 51 cents a share — after backing out restructuring costs — came in a nickel ahead of estimates, and sales of $22.91 billion topped $22.76 billion forecasts. The IT giant’s January quarter guidance of 46 to 48 cents a share was ahead of analysts’ forecast of 44-cent earnings, but sales guidance of $22.3-$22.6 billion was at the low end of $22.61 billion estimates. “HP delivered another strong quarterly performance, with balanced revenue growth, good cost discipline, improved margins in key businesses and strong cash flow,” HP CEO Mark Hurd said in a statement. “We are pleased with our progress to date, but there is more work ahead of us.” The results were led by 9% growth in Personal Systems, a 12% increase in server sales, a 17% jump in storage sales, and 11% growth in software. Services were up 6%, and imaging and printing 4%. Within Personal Systems, desktop revenue rose 1%, notebook sales grew 23%, and workstations sales climbed 8%. Overall sales increased 7%. Shares of HP surged 6% in after-hours trading, on top of a 2.5% gain during the day. The broader market posted solid results on Thursday, as stocks benefited from a big drop in energy prices and falling interest rates. The Nasdaq soared 32 to a four-year high of 2220, the S&P 500 rose 11 to 1242, and the Dow gained 45 to 10,720. Volume rose to 2.28 billion shares on the NYSE, and 1.87 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led 24-8 on the NYSE, and 22-8 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 81% on the NYSE, and 78% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 156-176 on the NYSE, and 123-69 on the Nasdaq. Google Applied Materials Network Appliance recent turnaround is showing signs of sticking.
recent troubles.
surpassed $400 for the first time. The company’s market cap is now bigger than Cisco’s
. Microsoft
, Intel
and IBM
are the only tech stocks with bigger market caps than Google’s $113 billion valuation. Google could conceivably catch IBM’s $137 billion and Intel’s $150 billion valuations, but at nearly $300 billion, Microsoft is still a long way off.
lost 2.4% after the company lowered earnings expectations.
, Intuit
, Salesforce.com
, Kulicke & Soffa
, Micromuse
and Ansoft
posted strong gains on their results.