IBM exceeds quarterly forecasts and raises its full-year earnings prediction

October 21, 2022: -The company added that the foreign-exchange rates should result in 7% less revenue than it would generate in the year. IBM reiterated its guidance from July of nearly $10 billion in free cash flow.

“I certainly hope we are seeing the end of the dollar strengthening,” Krishna added on a conference call with analysts.

In Europe, the energy crisis and inflation make for more cautious conversations, but the issues aren’t reflected yet in the data, Krishna said.

IBM spun off its taken care of infrastructure benefits business into Kyndryl in November 2021. The company finished the third quarter with a $3.21 billion loss from ongoing operations, compared with income of $1.04 billion before the year quarter. During the third quarter, IBM paid a one-time non-cash pension arrangement charge to transfer some pension obligations and assets to third-party insurers. IBM says an adjusted pre-tax level of 13.9%, while analysts polled by StreetAccount had been skimming for 15.1%.

Revenue from software totaled $5.81 billion. That represents growth of almost 7.5% yearly and exceeds the $5.54 billion consensus estimate among analysts polled by StreetAccount. On the conference call, about 8% of software earnings came from a commercial contact with Kyndryl, Jim Kavanaugh stated, IBM’s finance chief. Revenue from transaction processing software grew by 23%.

Consulting revenue came to $4.70 billion, up to 5.5% and above the StreetAccount consensus of $4.51 billion. Pre-tax margins in the consulting unit narrowed to 9.8% from 10.5%. Continued labor cost inflation factored into profit for the department, IBM said. “Although, coming out of the third quarter, we are experiencing signs of progress,” Kavanaugh said, which flags higher utilization rates.

Sales of the z16 mainframe computer started in the second quarter. Earnings from IBM’s z Systems line of mainframe computers surged 88%. The infrastructure segment is giving $3.35 billion, up 14.8% and more than the $3.06 billion StreetAccount consensus. “Mainframe hardware had a strong start,” Krishna stated.

During the quarter, IBM says that the acquisition of consulting company Dialexa and observability software startup Databand.ai, along with the recent servers which contain its Power10 chips.

Notwithstanding the after-hours move, IBM shares have decreased 8% this year, while the S&P 500 U.S. stock index is down nearly 23% over the same period.