October 20th, 2009
Earnings flash (memory): SanDisk delivers big quarter
SanDisk CEO Eli Harari said he was encouraged by “improved industry fundamentals.” And there’s a good reason for that. The company crushed third quarter estimates with a blowout quarter.
The flash memory card maker reported net income of $231 million, or 99 cents a share, on revenue of $935 million, up 14 percent from a year ago. Those results reversed a year ago loss of $166 million, or 74 cents a share. Excluding a bevy of items—acquisition expenses, option compensation and interest expenses related to retiring debt—SanDisk reported earnings of $176 million, or 75 cents a share (statement).
To put all of those moving parts in perspective, Wall Street was expecting earnings of 26 cents a share on $787.9 million. Harari also added that he expects strong pricing and orders to continue into the fourth quarter.
A few odds and ends:
- SanDisk shipped 31 percent more units compared to a year ago;
- Average price per gigabyte sold fell 43 percent from a year ago;
- Average retail card capacity was 4.22 GB, up 46 percent from a year ago.
Overall, things are looking up in the storage industry. Separately, Seagate reported fiscal first quarter non-GAAP earnings of 58 cents a share, 11 cents better than estimates. The company also raised its outlook for the second quarter (statement).
Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and Editorial Director of ZDNet sister site TechRepublic. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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