Technology

What Analysts Are Saying About Akamai Tech After Guidance

Chris Lange

Published: May 3, 2017 1:45 pm

Last Updated: January 12, 2020 12:22 pm

When Akamai Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM) released its first-quarter financial results late on Tuesday, earnings were better than expected. But looking at how the stock is performing, this is not the entire story. What tanked this stock was its guidance given separately in the conference call. Also it did not help that analysts took this opportunity to cut their targets on Akamai.

24/7 Wall St. has included a few brief highlights from the earnings report, as well as what a few analysts are saying about Akamai after the fact.

The company said in the release that it had $0.69 in earnings per share (EPS) and $609.2 million in revenue, compared with consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters, which were expecting $0.67 in EPS and revenue of $604.69 million. The same period of last year reportedly had EPS of $0.66 and $567.73 million in revenue.

In the conference call, management commented that it expects current quarter revenue to be in the range of $597 million to $609 million, which falls somewhat short of expectations. The consensus estimates for the second quarter are $0.65 in EPS and $623.02 million in revenue.

In terms of its solution segments, the company reported:

• Performance and Security Solutions revenue was $369 million, up 17% from last year and up 18% adjusted for currency.
• Cloud Security Solutions revenue, a component of Performance and Security, was $110 million, up 36% year over year and up 37% on a currency-adjusted basis.
• Media Delivery Solutions revenue was $187 million, down 9% from last year and when adjusted for foreign exchange.
• Services and Support Solutions revenue was $53 million, up 15% year over year and when adjusted for currency.

Cash from operations in the quarter totaled $143 million, or 23% of revenue. The company also spent $72 million repurchasing common stock during this quarter. On the books, Akamai’s cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities totaled $1.6 billion at the end of March.

A few analysts took this opportunity to weigh in on Akamai:

• Craig-Hallum has a Hold rating and cut its price target to $51 from $56.
• D.A. Davidson downgraded it to Neutral from Buy and lowered its target to $57 from $76.
• Guggenheim cut its rating to Neutral from Buy.
• Morgan Stanley lowered its price target to $52 from $54.
• Oppenheimer cut its price target from $80 to $70.
• RBC has a Sector Perform rating and lowered its price target to $58 from $65.
• SunTrust Robinson downgraded it to Hold from Buy and cut its target to $54 from $82.
• Wells Fargo downgraded it to a Market Perform rating from Outperform.

Shares of Akamai were last seen down 16% at $52.33, with a consensus analyst price target of $71.20 and a 52-week trading range of $47.80 to $71.64.