Are Oracle Results Enough for Investors?

Oracle Corp. (NYSE: ORCL) reported its fiscal second-quarter financial results after the markets closed on Wednesday. The company had $0.63 in earnings per share (EPS) on $9.0 billion in revenue, which compares to consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters of $0.60 in EPS on revenue of $9.06 billion. In the same period of the previous year, Oracle posted EPS of $0.69 and $9.61 billion in revenue.

Overall, this was a very strong growth quarter for Oracle’s cloud business, with software as a service (SaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS) bookings up 75% in constant currency and billings up 68% in U.S. dollars. The company did 100 Fusion HCM deals and over 300 Fusion ERP deals in the quarter.

The company is still on-target to sell and book over $1.5 billion of new SaaS and PaaS business this fiscal year. Ultimately, this is considerably more SaaS and PaaS new business than any other cloud services provider, including Salesforce.com.

During this quarter, the board of directors declared a cash dividend of $0.15 per share, which will be paid on January 27 to shareholders of record as of January 6.
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Safra Catz, CEO of Oracle, commented on earnings:

We’re very pleased with our non-GAAP EPS of $0.63, beating the mid-point of guidance by 4 cents despite a stronger than expected currency headwind. … We grew our SaaS and PaaS revenue 38% in constant dollars this past quarter, and we expect that revenue growth rate to accelerate to nearly 50% in Q3 and close to 60% in Q4. This rapid increase in our cloud revenue will help drive our SaaS and PaaS cloud gross margins from 43% in Q2 to approaching 60% in Q4 and drive significant EPS growth in Q4.

On the books, the company has cash and equivalents totaling $17.4 billion, compared to $21.7 billion at the end of the previous fiscal year.

Shares of Oracle closed Wednesday up 1.8% at $38.91, with a consensus analyst price target of $44.15 and a 52-week trading range of $35.14 to $46.71. Following the release of the earnings report, shares were down 1% at $38.50 in early trading indications Thursday.