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May 23rd, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – NetApp Inc forecast revenue below expectations and its CEO warned he is cautious about the outlook for business in Europe, sending the data storage equipment maker’s shares down nearly 22 percent in after-hours trade.
NetApp’s report Wednesday came a day after Dell Inc posted disappointing quarterly results that heightened concerns about cautious IT spending, sending tech stocks sharply lower.
“The EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) story is one of uncertainty. We could be seeing a rebound or we could be seeing a strong degradation from there,” Chief Executive Tom Georgens told Reuters in telephone interview.
“It’s time for us to be cautious,” he added.
The growing popularity of mobile gadgets like Apple’s iPhone, which access remote computing power and data over the Internet, has fueled demand for storage products sold by NetApp and rivals like EMC Corp .
But NetApp’s growth has been affected this year by weak spending by U.S. military and intelligence agencies, which are major customers.
A sizeable amount of NetApp’s sales also comes from Europe, where a debt crisis has shaken confidence in the economy and policy makers fear Greece could even pull out of the European Union.
“European macro is weak right now in May and it only gets worse as we head into the summer months, which historically are the weakest period of the year,” said Piper Jaffray analyst Andrew Nowinski.
New product launches from EMC are also expected to increase pressure on NetApp in the July quarter.
“The outlook is surprisingly very poor,” said ThinkEquity analyst Rajesh Ghai. “They’re probably losing some market share, maybe being pushed to the corner by bigger boys like EMC.”
Concerns about enterprise spending have helped send shares of NetApp 30 percent lower since the end of March – not including Wednesday’s after-hours sell-off. They have traded recently around 12 times expected earnings.
Sunnyvale, California-based NetApp posted fiscal fourth-quarter revenue of $1.70 billion compared with $1.43 billion in the year-ago period.
NetApp said it expects current-quarter revenue to be in the range of $1.40 billion to $1.50 billion. Analysts had expected NetApp to post $1.684 billion in revenue for the quarter ending in April and $1.606 billion for the quarter ending in July, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
NetApp’s net income for the fourth quarter was $181 million, or 47 cents a share, according to generally accepted accounting principles, compared with $161 million, or 40 cents a share, in the same quarter last year.
Adjusted earnings per share were 66 cents, versus expectations of 63 cents.
The company said current-quarter non-GAAP earnings per share would be between 34 and 39 cents per share.
Shares of NetApp were down 21.5 percent at $25.81 in extended trading after closing down 1.3 percent at $32.86 in the regular session on the Nasdaq.
(Reporting by Noel Randewich; Editing by Carol Bishopric and Matthew Lewis)
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