Morning Note: Market news and an update from Salesforce.
Market News
US equities inched higher last night – S&P 500 (+0.1%, to its 55th closing high of the year); Nasdaq (+0.4%). The Fed’s Mary Daly said a rate cut this month isn’t certain but remains on the table. Adriana Kugler said inflation appears to be on a sustainable path toward the central bank’s 2% goal. The focus will shift to Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s remarks due later in the day. The 10-year Treasury yields 4.25%, while gold trades at $2,642 an ounce.
In Asia this morning, equity markets were mixed after South Korea’s political turmoil triggered by a brief imposition of martial law. The Kospi Index fell by 2%, while the won regained some ground after tumbling overnight in offshore trading. Elsewhere: Nikkei 225 (+0.1%); Hang Seng (-0.1%); Shanghai Composite (-0.4%).
The FTSE 100 is currently trading 0.3% lower at 8,337, while Sterling trades at $1.2678 and €1.2063.
Brent Crude moved up to $73.80 a barrel as OPEC+ made progress toward a deal to delay further plans to restore shuttered supply. Centrica has announced the extension of the lives of its four operational nuclear power stations alongside its partner, EDF.
President Emmanuel Macron urged French lawmakers to reject a no-confidence vote today. He said he wouldn’t resign before his term ends. Voting is expected to start shortly after 4pm local time.
Source: Bloomberg
Company News
Last night, Salesforce released results for the third quarter of its financial year to January 2025. Revenue was slightly better than expected, helped by robust spending on its enterprise cloud portfolio. The company raised its guidance for the full year. In response, the shares were marked up by 10% in after-hours trading last night.
Salesforce is the world’s number one customer relationship management (CRM) platform with more than 150,000 customers. Its cloud-based CRM applications for sales, service, and marketing don’t require IT experts to set up or manage. The pandemic greatly accelerated the move by companies and governments to an all-digital world, where work happens wherever people are, whether they’re in the office, at home, or somewhere in between. The company also owns Slack Technologies, the enterprise communications platform. Agentforce is the group’s complete AI system for enterprises built into the Salesforce Platform.
In its last financial year, to end January 2024, the group reported revenue of $35bn, up 11%, and an operating margin of 30.5%.
In the three months to 31 October 2024, revenue grew by 8% at constant currency to $9.44bn, just above the market forecast of $9.35bn. The majority of revenue was derived from Subscription & Support, which grew by 9% to $8.88bn. By region, the Americas is the greatest source of revenue (66%), with growth of 6% in the quarter. Elsewhere Europe and Asia Pacific grew by 9% and 14% respectively.
The group discloses all future revenue under contract that has not yet been recognised as revenue, known as Remaining Performance Obligation. For the next 12 months, this now stands at $26.4bn, up 10% year-on-year.
The operating margin rose by 190 basis points to 33.1%, while EPS grew by 14% to $2.41, a touch below the consensus forecast of $2.44. Free cash flow grew by 30% to $1.78bn. At the beginning of the year, the company initiated a quarterly dividend of $0.40 per share. The company is also buying back its shares – during the latest quarter $1.2bn was repurchased, leaving an authorisation of $10.6bn.
The group nudged up its guidance for the financial year to end January 2025: revenue is expected to grow by 8%-9% to $37.8bn to $38.0bn. Operating margin guidance has been raised from 32.5% to 32.9%. New guidance has been provided for the current quarter (i.e., the three months to 31 January 2025), with revenue expected to grow by 7%-9% to $9.9bn-$10.1bn.
Source: Bloomberg