Analysts Get Much More Aggressive About Oracle

March 16, 2017 by Chris Lange

When Oracle Corp. (NYSE: ORCL) reported fiscal third-quarter financial results late on Wednesday, the company saw one of its best quarters in recent memory, at least according to the investor reaction. But investors weren’t the only ones thrilled with this report. Practically any analyst that was covering Oracle raised the price target in response to the report.

24/7 Wall St. has included some highlights from the earnings report, as well as what analysts are saying about this tech giant after the fact.

The company posted $0.69 in earnings per share (EPS) and $9.21 billion in revenue, compared with consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters that called for $0.62 in EPS and revenue of $9.26 billion. The same period of last year reportedly had EPS of $0.64 and $9.01 billion in revenue.

Short-term deferred revenues were $7.4 billion, up 7% in U.S. dollars and constant currency compared with last year.

Total cloud software as a service (SaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS) revenues were $1.0 billion, up 73% in U.S. dollars and up 74% in constant currency. Also, total Cloud Revenues, including infrastructure as a service (IaaS), were $1.2 billion, up 62% in U.S. dollars and up 63% in constant currency. Total Cloud and On-Premise Software Revenues were $7.4 billion, up 4% in U.S. dollars and up 5% in constant currency.

A horde of analysts saw this report and weighed in on Oracle, most growing much more bullish:

  • Barclays has an Overweight rating and raised its price target to $51 from $47.
  • Deutsche Bank has a Hold rating and raised its price target to $44 from $40.
  • Jefferies has a Buy rating and raised its price target from $51 to $52.
  • Morgan Stanley raised the price target to $47 from $43.
  • Merrill raised its price target to $54 from $48.
  • Raymond James raised its price target to $48 from $45.
  • JMP securities upgraded it to Market Perform from Underperform.
  • BMO raised its price target to $48 from $45.
  • UBS has a Buy rating and raised the price target from $45 to $48.
  • Goldman Sachs raised its price target to $49 from $47.
  • RBC raised the price target slightly to $47 from $46.
  • JPMorgan upgraded it to an Overweight rating from Neutral.
  • Wunderlich raised its price target to $46 from $43.

Shares of Oracle were trading up over 7% at $46.16 on Thursday, with a consensus analyst price target of $44.36 and a 52-week trading range of $37.62 to $46.99.

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