What happened

Shares of Talend (TLND) were up 20.8% as of 2:30 p.m. EDT on Friday after the cloud integration software specialist announced fourth-quarter 2018 results. 

Talend's quarterly revenue grew 34% year over year to $55.7 million, translating to an adjusted net loss of $3.9 million, or $0.13 per share, narrowed from a loss of $0.28 per share in the same year-ago period.

For perspective, recall that Talend stock plunged early last month after the company reduced its top-line guidance for the quarter, telling investors to expect revenue of $55.4 million to $55.8 million (down from its prior outlook for between $56.6 million and $57.4 million). And though we don't typically pay close attention to Wall Street's demands, most analysts were modeling a wider adjusted net loss of $0.15 per share.

Colorful Stock market charts indicating gains

Image source: Getty Images.

So what

It didn't help last month that Talend simultaneously announced the unexpected resignation of its vice president for worldwide sales, Brad Stratton, with CEO Mike Tuchen assuming the role as the company searches for a permanent replacement. 

In Talend's earnings press release yesterday, Tuchen noted the company grew subscription revenue 38% year over year to $48.4 million -- within its latest guidance for between $48.3 million and $48.6 million. 

"As we scale our business, we are increasingly focused on the cloud opportunity and have expanded our go-to-market capabilities with the addition of a self-service, frictionless channel to land new cloud customers," Tuchen added. "We believe we are entering 2019 well positioned to capture an increasing share of the data integration market."

Check out the latest Talend earnings call transcript.

Now what

To that end, Talend expects full-year 2019 revenue in the range of $248 million to $250 million, with an adjusted net loss per share of $0.94 to $0.88. Most investors watching the stock were expecting revenue near the low end of that range. 

With shares yet to recover from last month's drop following Talend's preliminary release, investors were more than happy to see the company step over its low bar and offer that strong guidance.