Multi-Year Tech Earnings Growth: Google, IBM, Apple Strong
I've been looking at a new online tool called StockSmart. The full version is being launched in June, and it will provide some pretty interesting realtime analysis that would normally require a lot of hunting through documents. For example, I took a look at earnings per share growth over the last few years of some name companies, and the results were fascinating.
Before the table, a couple of caveats. One is that this only includes companies that file in the U.S. Another is that I didn't include current year-to-date earnings, because that data won't be accurate, so I'm told, until June. Also, earnings are normalized to calendar years. In other words, the earnings for 2008 may not coincide with a company's reported earnings for its fiscal year 2008 if the fiscal year ends on a date other than December 31. An "N/A" indicates that no data was listed for that year. Finally, although the earnings growth information is available on the free version of the site, not all data is. However, given that a subscription is only $5 a month, I plan to sign up come the end of June, when all of the data should be real time.
Now, for the data (with earnings in US dollars and, as always, numbers in parentheses indicating a loss):
| Company | Ticker | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 |
| Adobe | ADBE | $1.14 | $1.14 | $1.38 | $1.81 |
| Amazon | AMZN | $0.62 | $0.45 | $1.12 | $1.50 |
| AMD | AMD | $0.62 | $0.84 | ($2.49) | ($1.67) |
| Apple | AAPL | $1.46 | $2.31 | $3.94 | $5.37 |
| BAIDU | BIDU | N/A | N/A | $2.43 | $4.38 |
| BMC | BMC | $0.61 | $1.01 | $1.31 | $1.73 |
| CA | CA | $0.82 | N/A | $0.86 | $1.15 |
| Cisco | CSCO | $0.91 | $1.04 | $1.25 | $1.42 |
| Dell | DELL | $1.29 | $1.57 | $1.17 | $1.38 |
| eBay | EBAY | $0.86 | $0.93 | $1.37 | $1.49 |
| EMC | EMC | $0.53 | $0.59 | $0.72 | $0.79 |
| IBM | IBM | $5.34 | $6.03 | $7.19 | $8.96 |
| HP | HPQ | $1.61 | $2.22 | $2.92 | $3.62 |
| Intel | INTC | $1.41 | $0.82 | $1.14 | $1.00 |
| Intuit | INTU | $1.03 | $1.18 | $1.26 | $1.37 |
| GOOG | $5.36 | $9.76 | $13.28 | $16.68 | |
| Juniper Networks | JNPR | $0.73 | N/A | $0.74 | $1.03 |
| McAfee | MFE | $1.22 | $1.06 | $1.40 | $1.68 |
| Microsoft | MSFT | $1.27 | $1.27 | $1.49 | $1.88 |
| NetApp | NTAP | $0.62 | $0.81 | $0.75 | $0.93 |
| Oracle | ORCL | $0.68 | $0.81 | $0.97 | $1.25 |
| Salesforce.com | CRM | $0.18 | $0.05 | $0.15 | $0.35 |
| SAP | SAP | $1.54 | $1.99 | $2.21 | $2.63 |
| Seagate | STX | $1.40 | $1.99 | $1.43 | $2.54 |
| Sun Microsystems | JAVA | ($0.04) | ($0.54) | $.52 | $.92 |
| Verizon | VZ | $2.56 | $2.54 | $2.39 | $2.55 |
| Western Digital | WDC | $0.99 | $1.61 | $1.94 | $4.10 |
| Yahoo | YHOO | $0.58 | $0.49 | $0.44 | $0.42 |
- The clear winner, at least as far as EPS goes, is Google, which blows away any competition, including IBM -- not an easy accomplishment. It may still lack serious income diversity, but even in a downturn in ad sales, this is a company that is almost scary in financial health.
- Apple has an EPS growth that should terrify most of its competitors.
- For a company that is so large, IBM's performance is stunning. From 2005 to 2008 it gained $3.62 a share.
- Chinese search company Baidu is showing the potential to become huge, going from nothing to $4.38 a share in just two years. The question is how the company will depend on riding China's overall growth as a strategy, or can it diversify.
- In this view, Microsoft looks weak, as EPS is relative flat in comparison to the leaders. Perhaps too many years of dependence on Windows and Office alone have taken a toll. It will be interesting to see what happens with Windows 7.
- Yahoo is clearly trending downward and not even in the same league as its competitors.
- Some other companies -- including Dell, EMC, and Intel -- are firmly in the going-nowhere-fast category.
- For all the talk about Salesforce.com, the company hasn't been able to transform interest into earnings growth.
Image via stock.xchng user svilen001, standard site license.