Cloudflare stock plunges more than 20% after revising guidance down

Earnings

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Signage outside the Cloudflare headquarters in San Francisco, California, U.S., on Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2022. Cloudflare Inc. is expected to release earnings figures on Feb. 10.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Cloudflare shares plunged as much as 25% in after-hours trading Thursday after the internet services and security company reported first-quarter results that missed on the top line, and also revised its full-year revenue guidance down.

Here are the key numbers:

  • Earnings: 8 cents per share, adjusted, vs. 3 cents per share expected, according to a Refinitiv survey of analysts
  • Revenue: $290.2 million vs. $290.8 million expected, according to Refinitiv

Cloudflare revised their full-year revenue guidance for 2023 down. The company guided to full-year revenue around $1.28 billion, versus a prior consensus of $1.33 billion. That revision is down significantly from Cloudflare’s prior guidance as well, which was between $1.33 billion and $1.34 billion.

The company also reported a net loss of $38 million for the quarter, compared to a $41 million loss for the year ago quarter.

Despite the bottom-line beat, investors apparently reacted to commentary from Cloudflare chief financial officer Thomas Seifert, who said that “increasing macroeconomic uncertainty over the course of the first quarter resulted in a material lengthening of sales cycles and a significant backend-weighting of linearity.”

Cloudflare’s guidance for the second-quarter of 2023 was also below consensus estimates. Cloudflare guided to revenue between $305 and $306 million, versus a consensus estimate of $319 million.