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Bloomberg
Oracle Corp’s shares rose on a strong sales forecast, signaling the world’s second-largest software maker expects greater customer demand in its transition to cloud-based computing.
Revenue will increase 2 percent to 4 percent in the current quarter, holding currency exchange rates constant, with higher growth through the second half of the fiscal year, Chief Executive Officer Safra Catz said in a conference call with analysts. Adjusted profit is projected at 83 cents a share to 85 cents a share in the fiscal third quarter. Analysts estimated 84 cents.
Oracle earlier reported fiscal second-quarter sales that were in line with analysts’ estimates.
Shares increased about 5 percent in extended trading.
Catz and Chief Executive Officer Mark Hurd have sought to move the information technology firm’s 430,000 customers to internet-based software from programs housed on their corporate servers, as a way to keep up with rapid sales growth of Amazon.com Inc’s cloud unit, Salesforce.com and others. Sales were little changed at $9.56 billion in the fiscal second quarter. Analysts, on average, had projected $9.52 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Revenue from Oracle’s cloud services and license support, which includes maintenance fees for its traditional software, grew 2.7 percent to $6.64 billion.