HP Earnings Fall But Beat Analyst Estimates

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In its latest quarterly earnings filing, HP reported that its revenue and profits dropped considerably. However, the news was still better than Wall Street had expected, leading to a sharp rise in the company’s share price.

CNNMoney’s Julianne Pepitone observed, “Hewlett-Packard is still struggling to turn itself around. But here’s the good news for HP and CEO Meg Whitman: When Wall Street estimates are set at rock bottom, they’re easy to beat. HP’s fiscal second-quarter earnings and revenue both slumped about 10% compared to a year ago, and sales in every individual HP business unit declined. But HP’s profit of 87 cents per share was still better than what analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected.”

Bloomberg’s Aaron Ricadela noted, “Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), the largest personal-computer maker, rose the most in three months after forecasting fiscal third-quarter profit that topped analysts’ estimates on cost cuts aimed at countering slumping demand for desktops and laptops. The shares jumped 13 percent to $24.05 at 10:10 a.m. in New York, after Hewlett-Packard yesterday delivered the view for the period through July. Earlier the stock traded at $24.08 for the biggest intraday rise since Feb. 22. The Palo Alto, California-based company had gained 49 percent this year before today, compared with a 16 percent increase in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index.”

All Things D’s Arik Hesseldahl added, “As expected, PC sales were pretty bad, with sales down 20 percent and a decrease in volume of 21 percent, which was much worse than Dell’s results reported last week. The PC unit generated a 3.2 percent operating margin.”

The New York Times quoted HP CEO Meg Whitman, who said, “We are rebuilding ourselves in some of the most profound changes I’ve seen. We have a number of growing businesses, but we have a number of declining businesses. It’s hard to cross over from one to the other.”