2.25.2012

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) Earnings Disappoint, Still a Tech Stock to Stay away from in 2012

By Brent Crowley


Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) sent disappointing earnings today (Wednesday), showing new CEO Meg Whitman is still functioning on nursing the tech giant again to well being.

Hewlett-Packard's modified earnings for every share have been 92 cents on income of $30 billion while in the initially quarter, whilst Wall Street was expecting H-P to make 87 cents on sales of $30.67 billion.

Earnings fell 32% from the similar period a year back, and income slipped 7%.

H-P could be the world's greatest Pc maker, but its glory days are prolonged gone. Above the previous year, H-P stock has fallen about 40%.

Its financials for your November - January fiscal quarter illustrate the steep climb H-P faces to get back its successful leading spot.

"All [its] segments are likely to have headwinds," an analyst at Securities USA Inc., told. "It's not likely to be a one-year turnaround."

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ): What's in Retailer for 2012

H-P in September brought in CEO Meg Whitman from eBay Inc. (Nasdaq: EBAY). Whitman's tasked with cleaning up the messes left by her predecessors, who drove the as soon as prolific business into an highly-priced identification crisis.

The business formerly targeted on engineering but then grow to be alot more involved with PCs with its $25 billion purchase of Compaq in 2002. H-P then invested $13.nine billion on Electronic Data Systems in 2008, and final yr invested $10 billion in software with its acquire of Autonomy Corp.

"Every time a new strategy comes out, the entire organization goes into shutdown mode," Phil McKinney, previous chief technological innovation officer within the Computer division, informed Barron's.

The quarter was Whitman's 1st full quarter as CEO, and according to McKinney she's previously forward from the former chiefs.

"She has invested a good volume of time speaking to most people, she's approachable," stated McKinney. "The previous chiefs did not even know in which the HP cafeteria was."

However the storied laptop or computer maker has two main obstructions to conquer this yr. With the top within the list would be the slowdown in laptop product sales.

In accordance with information from research organization a research firm Computer market place actually shrank one.4% inside the December quarter from a 12 months previously. Include to that the sudden burst in tablet product sales, and you can fairly quickly see a mixture of weak income and reduced revenue margins forward for H-P.

H-P also needs to fix its self-destructive decision to exit the Pc market. The idea to leave the Computer market arrived from earlier CEO Leo, who led for 11 months.

Tired of selling low-margin PCs, and with its tablet and smart phone offerings failing to catch on, H-P in August unveiled a massive alter in its strategy - abandoning its client efforts to concentrate on software package and services for corporations.

Then in Oct - just after ousting Apotheker - the firm reversed program and stated it would not spin off its Pc division.

Now H-P's big business clientele - organizations with a variety of hundred to several thousand users - demand to know H-P is in it for the long haul. Normally, they'll just obtain cheaper PCs and employ a program organization as an alternative to relying on H-P's help.

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) fell about 1.4% in after-hours buying and selling.




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