What happened
Micron Technology, Inc.'s (MU 0.25%) shares jumped 11.6% last month, according to data provided by S&P Global Market Intelligence, after the company prereleased its fiscal second-quarter 2018 revenue and earnings results. After Micron updated its guidance, two analysts upgraded the company's stock.
So what
Micron Technology's management said the company's second-quarter sales would be in the range of $7.2 billion to $7.35 billion, compared to its earlier guidance of $6.8 billion to $7.2 billion. The updated guidance also noted that earnings per share would be in the range between $2.70 and $2.75 per share, compared to prior guidance of $2.51 to $2.65.
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That led analysts from Needham & Co. and KeyBanc Capital Markets to both upgrade Micron's stock, with Rajvindra Gill from Needham writing that he believes the company will be able to expand its gross margins for NAND memory and that demand for solid-state drives (SSDs) from clients and data centers will increase, benefiting Micron.
Investors were clearly pleased with both the analyst upgrades and the updated guidance from Micron's management and pushed the company's share price up as a result.
Now what
Micron investors have kept the optimism going into March, with the company's shares jumping about 13% so far this month.
Micron's stock price has already gained 115% over the past 12 months -- compared to the S&P 500's 15% gains -- but there may be more room to run for this company. The current analyst consensus estimate for total full-year 2018 earnings is $10.10 per share, compared to $4.41 last year. That represents a very significant year-over-year increase and means that Micron investors could have even more to look forward to.
