Microsoft earnings, sales badly miss expectations; $900 million inventory writedown on Surface tablet flop

“Microsoft’s fourth quarter earnings and sales missed expectations by a wide margin as the PC market slowdown and a writedown of Surface RT inventory painted a bleak picture,” Larry Dignan reports for ZDNet.

“The company reported fourth quarter earnings of $4.97 billion, or 59 cents a share, on revenue of $19.9 billion,” Dignan reports. “The results include a $900 million inventory writedown for Surface RT that amounts to 7 cents a share.”

Dignan reports, “Wall Street was expecting Microsoft to report fourth quarter earnings of 75 cents a share on revenue of $20.73 billion… The quarter for Microsoft reflects a tale of two companies—an enterprise side that’s killing it and a Windows part that’s struggling to regain its footing as tablets cannibalize PCs.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Click!

Some people laughed when we stated:

As we have always said, even as many short-sightedly waved (and continue to wave) the white flag, the war is not over. And, yes, we shall prevail… No company is invincible. Not even Microsoft.MacDailyNews Take, January 10, 2005

Who’s laughing now?

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Steve Jobs’ revenge – April 12, 2013
Apple Macintosh on the rise as Windows PC market plummets – April 11, 2013
Gartner: PC Market posts 11.2 percent decline in Q113; Apple Mac sales up 7.4 percent in U.S. – April 10, 2013
IDC: PC shipments post the steepest decline ever in a single quarter, down 13.9% in Q113 – April 10, 2013

55 Comments

    1. Not really; for now, there is no perspective for Microsoft to become destroyed. It is still incredibly big and profitable.

      As Jobs said, there is no need for Microsoft to fail, for Apple to succeed. Microsoft just have to stagnate enough, and this is what they did.

    1. So all the “competition” (NOT!) report huge misses…oh what a surprise…

      Even with Apple’s new guidance, Apple will surprise all these idiot analists and know nothings on Tuesday- watch.

      Guaranteed.

        1. If recent history repeats, then sure, it will drop like a rock. But depending on the past to predict future stock movements tends to get investors blindsided. There’s a handful of good reasons to think AAPL has already past the low point and is starting the climb up. Its future is far from certain.

  1. Currently MS is a cash cow. The stock will remain level as long as they continue paying a decent dividend. When that ends, the stock will plunge. If the reorganization were bring done under someone like Lou Gerstner (IBM), then maybe there would be a chance to see MS’s revival.

          1. Wow, had to re-read that a few times. Takes me back to the early-80’s when my elementary school got our first Apple ][+ when I was in 5th grade. I even bought a book called “Basic Apple Basic” and it’s still on my bookshelf at my parent’s house.

  2. Ya know, there used to be Microsofties. What happened to them?

    It seems like every message I get from them now says “Sent from my iPad” or “Sent from my iPhone.”

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