Shares of Adobe (ADBE -1.62%) notched a 0.9% gain on Friday following the software-as-a-service (SaaS) company's release on the prior afternoon of its second-quarter results for fiscal 2023 (ended June 2).

Adobe's report was better than the stock's gain suggests. Indeed, shares opened 5.5% higher on Friday but steadily returned the bulk of their initial gain throughout the trading day. This dynamic was likely in part due to market conditions, as all major indexes closed down on Friday.

There was a lot to like about the report: The quarter's revenue and adjusted earnings exceeded Wall Street's consensus estimates, and management raised its annual guidance for the top and bottom lines. Moreover, the earnings outlook for fiscal Q3 came in higher than analysts had been projecting.

Adobe's key numbers

Metric Fiscal Q2 2022 Fiscal Q2 2023 Change YOY
Revenue $4.39 billion $4.82 billion 10%
GAAP operating income $1.53 billion $1.62 billion 6%
Adjusted operating income $1.98 billion $2.18 billion 10%
GAAP net income $1.18 billion $1.30 billion 10%
Adjusted net income $1.59 billion $1.79 billion 13%
GAAP EPS $2.49 $2.82 13%
Adjusted EPS $3.35 $3.91 17%

Data source: Adobe. GAAP = generally accepted accounting principles. EPS = earnings per share. YOY = year over year.

In constant currency, Adobe's revenue grew 13% year over year. Investors should focus on the adjusted numbers, which exclude one-time items.

Wall Street was looking for adjusted earnings per share (EPS) of $3.79 on revenue of $4.77 billion. So the company beat both expectations. It also surpassed its own guidance for revenue ($4.75 billion to $4.78 billion) and adjusted EPS ($3.75 to $3.80).

Adobe generated cash of $2.14 billion running its operations during the quarter, up 5% from the year-ago period. It ended the quarter with $6.60 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments and $3.63 billion in long-term debt.

Cash flows often don't get the attention they deserve. Adobe turned about 44% of its revenue into operating cash flow. That's a strong result.

What happened with Adobe in the quarter?

  • Digital media segment revenue grew 10% year over year to $3.51 billion, and digital experience segment revenue increased 12% to $1.22 billion.
  • Within the digital media segment, creative revenue increased 9% to $2.85 billion, and document cloud revenue rose 11% to $659 million.
  • Digital media annual recurring revenue (ARR) was $14.14 billion exiting the quarter.
  • Within the digital experience, subscription revenue grew 11% to $1.07 billion.
  • Remaining performance obligations (RPO) exiting the quarter was $15.22 billion.

What the CEO had to say

CEO Shantanu Narayen's statement in the earnings release was succinct:

Adobe achieved record Q2 revenue demonstrating strong demand across Creative Cloud, Document Cloud and Experience Cloud. Adobe's ground-breaking innovation positions us to lead the new era of generative AI given our rich datasets, foundation models and ubiquitous product interfaces.

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) became a hot topic late last year due largely to the popularity of OpenAI's chatbot, ChatGPT. Generative AI "enables users to quickly generate new content based on a variety of inputs," in the words of tech giant Nvidia, a dominant player in the AI space.

Guidance issued for Q3 and raised for full-year fiscal 2023

For the third quarter of fiscal 2023, management issued the following outlook:

  • Revenue of $4.83 billion to $4.87 billion, or growth of 9% to 10% year over year.
  • Adjusted EPS of $3.95 to $4.00, or growth of 16% to 18% year over year.

Going into the report, Wall Street had been looking for revenue of $4.86 billion and adjusted EPS of $3.89. So at the midpoints of the company's guidance ranges, revenue was a tad lighter than expected, while adjusted EPS comfortably exceeded the expectation.

For full-year fiscal 2023, management updated its guidance:

Metric

Prior Guidance 

Current Guidance

Annual Growth Implied by Guidance

Fiscal 2023 revenue

$19.10 billion to $19.30 billion

$19.25 billion to $19.35 billion

9% to 10%

Fiscal 2023 adjusted EPS

$15.30 to $15.60

$15.65 to $15.75

14% to 15%

Data source: Adobe. EPS = earnings per share.

The guidance does not reflect the company's planned acquisition of Figma, a web-first collaborative design platform it expects to close during 2023. That said, last month, Britain's competition regulatory agency said it was looking into the proposed deal to determine whether it could substantially dampen competition in the country.

In short, Adobe turned in a solid report, and fiscal 2023 seems poised to be a good year.