Red Hat Posts Solid Beat on Earnings

Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT) reported its fiscal second quarter financial results after the markets closed on Tuesday. The company had $0.47 in earnings per share (EPS) on $504 million in revenue compared to Thomson Reuters consensus estimates of $0.44 in EPS on $494.65 million in revenue. The same period from the previous year had $0.41 in EPS on $445.90 million in revenue.

The company has a quarterly subscription revenue of $442 million, up 13% year over year, and a quarterly operating cash flow of $120 million, up 12%. Overall total revenue was up 13% in U.S. dollars year over year, or 21% in constant currency.

Red Hat gave its guidance for the fiscal third quarter and the fiscal full year. For the third quarter the company expects $0.47 in EPS on $519 million to $523 million in revenue compared to consensus estimates of $0.46 in EPS on $513.56 million in revenue. For the fiscal full year the company expects $1.85 to $1.87 in EPS on $2.034 billion to $2.044 billion in revenue compared to the consensus estimates of $1.83 in EPS on $2.02 billion in revenue.

Jim Whitehurst, President and CEO of Red Hat, commented on earnings:

Strong execution in Q2 contributed to total revenue results that exceeded 21% year-over-year growth on a constant currency basis. We were pleased with the progress of our technologies that address cloud deployments across multiple footprints. Specifically in this quarter, we achieved a public cloud milestone in our Certified Cloud and Service Provider program of an annualized run-rate of $100 million. We are also thrilled to be the first open source company to achieve an annualized run-rate of $2 billion in revenue this quarter. In addition, we believe Red Hat is well-positioned for the second half of the fiscal year as we continue to benefit from delivering innovation to our customers.

On the books, operating cash flow was $120 million for the second quarter, an increase of 12%, from the same period in the previous year. The company had cash, cash equivalents and investments of $1.17 billion compared to $1.26 billion at the end of the previous fiscal year.

Shares of Red Hat closed Monday up 2.3% at $72.72 on its 52-week trading range of $52.53 to $81.49. Following the release of the earnings report, shares were initially up about 0.5% at $72.38 in the after-hours trading session. The stock has a consensus analyst price target of $83.30.

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