NetApp Shares Fall on Disappointing Outlook

By Josh Beckerman 

NetApp Inc. shares fell in late trading Wednesday after the maker of data-storage systems projected results for the current quarter below Wall Street estimates.

For the company's fourth quarter ending in April, NetApp projected per-share earnings excluding one-time items between 70 cents and 75 cents on revenue of $1.55 billion to $1.65 billion. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had expected per-share earnings of 89 cents and revenue of $1.69 billion, on average.

The company didn't explain the lower-than-expected guidance in its news release, but Wells Fargo earlier this week said currency issues could mute NetApp's outlook because the European region has historically represented around a third of NetApp's sales.

Shares of NetApp, down 8.9% over the past 12 months, fell 5% in after-hours trading to $37.74.

NetApp has enhanced its cloud-related product offerings, releasing items such as NetApp Private Storage for Amazon Web Services and for Microsoft Azure.

In October, NetApp bought the SteelStore product line, used for data backup and archiving to the cloud, from Riverbed Technology Inc. for $80 million.

For the quarter ended Jan. 23, NetApp reported a profit of $176.8 million, or 56 cents a share, compared with $192.1 million, or 55 cents a share, a year earlier. The latest quarter had fewer shares outstanding than a year ago.

Excluding items, per-share earnings were flat at 75 cents.

Net revenue fell to $1.55 billion from $1.61 billion.

NetApp had projected earnings excluding items of 74 cents to 79 cents a share on revenue of $1.56 billion to $1.66 billion.

The company said Wednesday that it authorized an additional $2.5 billion for stock repurchases, which it expects will take place by May 2018. NetApp has $206 million remaining under a previous authorization, and plans to buy back that amount of stock by May.

Write to Josh Beckerman at [e-mail]

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