After the closing bell on Tuesday, Oracle Corp. (ORCL) reported its fiscal Q3 2015 results, from the quarter ended February. For the first time in many quarters we finally saw a one-penny positive earnings per share (EPS) of 65 cents in the quarter (before non-recurring items, or BNRI) for the iconic tech giant. Adobe Systems (ADBE) also reported its fiscal Q1 2015 (February) results, and the global software firm saw higher-than-expected revenues on an in-line 27 cents per share (also BNRI).
Both companies focused on their cloud space, which both consider an important and growing segment of their businesses. Oracle met cloud-growth expectations of 5 percent, though cloud-based solutions make up only single-digit amounts of Oracle's total revenues (roughly 5-8 percent). Adobe, while better-than-expected in its overall sales in the quarter, actually posted a much weaker cloud subscriber number: 517K in the quarter, as opposed to expectations of around 570K.
For Oracle, changing over much of its business model and away from traditional revenue streams such as standard licensing growth, which was down 4 percent year over year, is the main reason for relatively lackluster earnings announcements over the past several quarters until today. Oracle's margins shrank in the quarter, which is likely something the company will address in its upcoming conference call. That said, ORCL stock is up about 1 percent in after-market trading.
Conversely, Adobe has typically performed well over the past year, posting an average quarterly positive earnings surprise of more than 28 percent until today's meet on the bottom line. Adobe is also further along in its cloud-centric development than is Oracle (although Mark Hurd's statement for Oracle today mentioned 28-29 percent in cloud growth, which is good). The all-time high for ADBE stock, in fact, was reached just a couple weeks ago when shares touched $80.30 late last month. Adobe shares are down more than 3 percent in late trading today, likely due somewhat to missing cloud subscriber expectations.
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