IBM Reports Q1 Earnings

International Business Machines IBM announced its first quarter 2014 results this afternoon, April 16, 2014. Shares of IBM are currently trading down 8.29 or 4.22 percent per share to $188.01.

IBM announced that its first quarter 2014 diluted earnings fell to $2.29 per share, which represents a year-to-year decrease of 15 percent.

Operating diluted earnings were 2.54 per share, compared to operating earnings of $3.00 per share in the first quarter of 2013; this again represented a decrease of 15 percent.

The company also reported first quarter net income of $2.4 billion, which was down 21 percent year-over-year.

IBM reported total revenues for the first quarter at 22.5 billion representing a four percent decrease.

• Software, Services and Global Financing each grew, adjusting for currency
• Software up 2 percent as reported and adjusting for currency
• Services down 2 percent; up 2 percent adjusting for currency and excluding divested customer care outsourcing business.
• Global Financing up 3 percent, up 6 percent adjusting for currency.
• Systems and Technology down 23 percent as reported and adjusting for currency.
• Services backlog of $138 billion, up 1 percent adjusting for currency and excluding divested customer care outsourcing business.
• Business analytics revenue up 5 percent, up 6 percent adjusting for currency.
• Cloud revenue up more than 50 percent, for cloud delivered as a service. First-quarter annual run rate of $2.3 billion doubled year to year;

Ginni Rometty, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer, “In the first quarter, we continued to take actions to transform parts of the business and to shift aggressively to our strategic growth areas including cloud, big data analytics, social, mobile and security.”

Rometty continued, “As we move through 2014, we will begin to see the benefits from these actions. Over the long term, they will position us to drive growth and higher value for our clients.”

As for guidance, IBM expects full-year 2014 GAAP diluted earnings per share of at least $17.00, and operating diluted per share of at least $18.00.

Revenues for the company's growth markets (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) decreased 11 percent.