HP Shares Fall as Sales, Outlook Lag Street View

Shares of PC giant Hewlett-Packard Co (NYSE: HPQ) fell 9 percent Wednesday after its quarterly sales and outlook came in below Wall Street expectations.

The shares fell $4.64, or 9.62 percent, to close the day's trading at $43.59.

For the first quarter ended Jan.31, HP earned $2.60 billion, or $1.17 a share, compared with $2.25 billion, or 93 cents a share, in the same quarter last year. Excluding items, the company earned $1.36 a share, topping Street view of $1.29 a share, according to analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

Net revenues rose 4 percent to $32.30 billion, yet came in below consensus estimate of $32.95 billion.

In November, HP had said it expects first quarter GAAP earnings in the range of 90 to 92 cents a share and non-GAAP earnings of $1.03 to $1.05 a share on revenue of about $29.6 billion to $29.9 billion.

HP said weaker than expected consumer PC shipments and services demand hit its revenues. HP, however, said it saw balanced growth in the first quarter across all regions in local currency, with accelerated growth in BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China).

Quarterly revenue from Americas rose 6 percent to $14.4 billion, while revenue was flat in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Meanwhile, Asia Pacific sales grew 7 percent to $5.8 billion.

Revenue from outside of the United States accounted for 65 percent of total HP revenue, with revenue in the BRIC countries increasing 11 percent and representing 11 percent of total HP revenue.

Segment wise, personal systems group revenue fell 1 percent, hurt by a 12 percent drop in revenues from consumer clients. Revenue from services also dropped 2 percent.

However, HP managed to grow its revenues from imaging and printing business by 7 percent and enterprise, server, storage business by 22 percent.

HP generated $3.1 billion in cash flow from operations in the first quarter and exited the quarter with $10.0 billion in gross cash.

For the second quarter, HP expects GAAP earnings of 99 cents to $1.01 a share and non-GAAP earnings o f $1.19 to $1.21 a share on revenue of about $31.4 billion to $31.6 billion.

Analysts expect earnings of $1.25 a share on revenue of $32.59 billion for the second quarter.

For the full year fiscal 2011, the company said it now forecasts GAAP earnings of $4.46 to $4.54 a share and non-GAAP earnings of $5.20 to $5.28 a share. It sees revenue in the range of $130 billion to $131.5 billion.

Analysts expect earnings of $5.24 a share on revenue of $132.95 billion for the full year.

While there could be some management conservatism here given CEO Apotheker's new tenure, we do think weak consumer PC spending overall and iPad cannibalization impacts are hurting sales, a net negative for PC related chip suppliers, FBR Capital Markets analyst Craig Berger wrote in a note to clients.