Salesforce said in December that it had agreed to buy Slack Technologies.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Salesforce posted slightly better-than-expected results for the quarter ended Jan. 31, but the numbers weren’t strong enough to provide any significant lift to its stock price.
For its fiscal fourth quarter, the cloud-based provider of enterprise sales software posted revenue of $5.82 billion, up 20% from a year earlier. The figure was above both the range of $5.665 billion to $5.675 billion management had told investors to expect, and the Wall Street consensus forecast for $5.68 billion.
Adjusted profits were $1.04 a share, above the guidance range of 73 to 74 cents a share and the Street consensus at 75 cents, although the company noted that the total included 22 cents a share in gains related to mark-to-market accounting on its investment portfolio. Earnings under generally accepted accounting principles were 28 cents a share.
For the April quarter, Salesforce sees revenue of $5.875 billion to $5.885 billion, ahead of the Street consensus at $5.72 billion, with non-GAAP profits of 88 to 89 cents a share, ahead of the Street at 76 cents. The company sees GAAP profits of 56 to 57 cents a share for the quarter.
For the January 2022 fiscal year, Salesforce is projecting revenue of $25.65 billion to $25.75 billion, up from the range of $25.45 billion to $25.55 billion it had predicted earlier. The company sees full year non-GAAP profits of $3.39 to $3.41 a share, falling shy of the $3.50 a share consensus among Wall Street analysts.
Salesforce said in December that it had agreed to buy Slack Technologies (WORK). The company noted that the 2022 forecast includes an expected $600 million in revenue from Slack, and assumes the deal closes late in the fiscal second quarter.
For the full fiscal year, revenue was $21.25 billion, up 24%, with profits of $4.92 a share on a non-GAAP basis. Earnings were $4.38 a share on a GAAP basis.
“We had a record quarter and year by innovating more and faster than ever, enabling our customers to be successful from anywhere, and becoming more relevant and strategic than ever,” CEO Marc Benioff said in a statement. “And we continued to serve all of our stakeholders in a time when they needed it most.”
In late trading, Salesforce was down 2.2%, to $226.
Write to Eric J. Savitz at [email protected]
