Intuit Beats On Q3 Profit, Sales, Guidance Weighs

shares plummeted in Tuesday's after-hours trading session as the company posted inline third-quarter earnings but gave weak guidance. Revenue for the quarter was $2.39 billion while analysts were anticipating $2.38 billion. This revenue figure is 9.63 percent higher than the same period a year ago. Earnings beat the analyst consensus by 0.86 percent at $3.53 per share. Earnings rose almost twice as fast as revenue, up 18.9 percent year over year. Much of this increase can be attributed to selling and marketing expenses falling from 18.4 percent to 17.3 percent of sales, in addition to falling amortization expenses. Operating income as a percentage of sales rose by 16 percent. Intuit saw significant growth for its new QuickBooks offerings. QuickBooks Online added 36 percent more subscribers, bringing the total to 624,000. Global QuickBooks Online grew 130 percent bringing the number of subscribers to 64,000. EPS for the upcoming quarter is expected to come in at just $0.06 to $0.08; the previous estimate the company provided was a range of $0.11 to $0.13. Analysts are currently expecting EPS of $0.12. Conversely, Intuit did not cut estimates for the full year 2014. The company now expects EPS of $3.54 to $3.58 versus the previous projection of $3.52 to $3.60. Shares of Intuit are recovering slowly from the session's low of $72.85. Shares last trading at $74.06, down 3.63 percent from Tuesday's closing bell.