Has IBM Stopped the Bleeding With Earnings?

Big Blue maintained its guidance for the 2015 full year of flat free cash flow year-to-year, and EPS in a range of $15.75 to $16.50. There is a consensus estimate of $15.89 in EPS. The company reported a services backlog of $121 billion, which was flat year-to-year, adjusting for currency and divested businesses. At the same time last year, without currency and divesting included, IBM’s backlog was $138 billion.

During this quarter, the company returned $2.3 billion to shareholders, consisting of $1.1 billion in dividends and gross share repurchases of $1.2 billion.

Revenues for the first quarter were represented as being flat year-to-year, adjusting for currency (8%) and divested businesses (4%), but the headline’s raw report is down 12% as reported.

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In terms of its segments, IBM reported:

• Global Services revenues decreased 12% (down 2% adjusting for currency and divested businesses) to $12.2 billion.
• Revenues from the Software segment were down 8% to $5.2 billion (down 2% adjusting for currency) compared with the first quarter of 2014.
• Revenues for the Systems Hardware segment totaled $1.7 billion for the quarter, down 23% (up 30% adjusting for currency and the impact of the divested System x business) from the first quarter of 2014.
• Global Financing segment revenues were down 10% (down 1% adjusting for currency) in the first quarter to $0.5 billion.

Ginni Rometty, chairman, president and CEO of IBM, commented on the earnings:

In the first quarter we had a strong start to the year. Our strategic imperatives growth rate accelerated, demonstrating the power of our offerings in these new opportunities and contributing to improved revenue performance. Our focus on higher value through portfolio transformation and investment in key areas of the business drove continued margin expansion.

Shares of Big Blue closed Monday up 3.4% at $166.16. Following the release of the earnings report, shares were initially up but then went flat in after-hours trading on the heels of the earnings report. The stock has a consensus analyst price target of $158.17 and a 52-week trading range of $149.52 to $196.86.

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