Stock fell as much as 6% in after-hours trading, but swings to 6% gain after missing number in forecast is replaced
CrowdStrike Holdings Inc. topped Wall Street estimates with quarterly results Thursday, and the cybersecurity company’s stock turned around after a typo in its outlook was corrected.
CrowdStrike CRWD, -3.69% shares had been down as much as 6% in the extended session, but after a missing number in the company’s forecast was replaced, the stock swung to a gain of as much as 6%, and was last up 5.5%.
That equates to a swing of roughly $1.38 billion in market capitalization, from a loss of about $718.5 million to an increase of about $657.5 million.
CrowdStrike expects an adjusted loss of 9 cents to 8 cents a share on revenue of $135.9 million to $138.6 million in the fourth quarter, but the original press release dropped the 1 from the top end of that range, making it $38.6 million.
“It was a typo related to the wire service,” George Kurtz, CrowdStrike co-founder and chief executive, told MarketWatch in an interview Thursday afternoon. “The release was reissued.”
The company reported a third-quarter loss of $35.5 million, or 17 cents a share, compared with $42.3 million, or 93 cents a share, in the year-ago period. The adjusted loss was 7 cents a share. Revenue rose to $125.1 million from $66.4 million in the year-ago quarter. Analysts surveyed by FactSet had forecast a loss of 11 cents a share on revenue of $118.8 million for the third quarter, and a loss of 11 cents a share on revenue of $127.2 million for the fourth quarter.
Kurtz pointed to two “significant milestones” in the quarter, with annual recurring revenue, or ARR, growing 97% from last year and topping half a billion dollars, and positive cash flow in the quarter. ARR is a Software-as-a-Service metric that shows how much revenue the company can expect based on subscriptions. CrowdStrike reported ARR of $501.7 million for the quarter, while the Street expected $471 million, while the number of subscription customers jumped by 772, or 112% year-over-year, to a total of 4,561 customers.
CrowdStrike noted its cash generated from operations surged to $38.6 million from $3.6 million in the year-ago period, as free-cash flow improved to $7 million from a deficit of $13.1 million in the year-ago period, as more subscribers adopt multiple cloud modules from the company, improving margins.
“This, I think, is reflective of a very strong SaaS business,” Kurtz told MarketWatch. “You go through this curve where you have losses and then you begin to generate cash.”
CrowdStrike raised its full-year forecast to a loss of 53 cents to 52 cents a share on revenue of $465.2 million to $468 million. Analysts had expected a loss of 63 cents a share on revenue of $450.2 million for the year.
As of the close, CrowdStrike CRWD, -3.69% shares were 55% above their June IPO pricing, a far cry from the company’s last earnings report in September, when shares were 155% above the IPO price. Shares plunged 39% in the past three months, as the S&P 500 index SPX, +0.15% gained 4.8%.
Of the 20 analysts who cover CrowdStrike, 12 have overweight or buy ratings, seven have hold ratings, and one has a sell rating, with an average price target of $79.90, according to FactSet data.