This week has brought declines to Wall Street, and indications suggested some more declines were in store for stock investors on Thursday morning. Moves lower in stock index futures were quite small but nevertheless failed to provide a bounce after two days of falling prices.
One concern investors have had is that prolonged high interest rates could cause the economy to fall into a recession. So far, signs of a slowdown have been somewhat ambiguous, with various sectors of the economy holding up better than others. Today's news from Accenture (ACN -0.32%) and Darden Restaurants (DRI -0.28%) provided some more information that investors can use to determine the near-term likelihood of more difficult macroeconomic conditions ahead. Here's what these two companies had to say about their respective businesses and what lies ahead.
Accenture taps the brakes
Shares of Accenture were down nearly 5% in premarket trading Thursday morning. The consulting company has expected to get a bump in client interest in artificial intelligence (AI), but its fiscal third-quarter financial report for the period ended May 31 included some forecasts that suggested a possible slowdown in future business.
For the most part, Accenture's quarterly numbers came in fairly strong. Revenue of $16.56 billion matched investor expectations almost exactly, rising 2.5% year over year. Net income came in at $2.05 billion, up nearly 13% from year-ago levels. Adjusted earnings of $3.19 per share were 14% higher than in the previous year's period, and free cash flow also perked up by nearly 10%.
Concerns arose from sluggish growth in Accenture's new bookings. The $17.25 billion figure for the fiscal third quarter was up just 2% year over year, split nearly evenly across consulting and managed services. Investors have hoped that Accenture would get significant growth from AI, but weakness among clients appears to have made some of them more conservative in devoting financial resources toward building out their AI capabilities.
Accenture also cast a shadow on its full-year fiscal 2023 sales projections, guiding toward the bottom end of its previous growth range. Revenue gains of 8% to 9% in local currency terms is nothing to sneeze at for a company Accenture's size, but growth-hungry investors have extremely high expectations about what the IT consultant's future should look like.
Darden drops despite dividend hike
Shares of Darden Restaurants were down almost 4% in premarket trading following the release of fiscal fourth-quarter financial results for the period ended May 28. The move lower came despite solid numbers and a considerable return of capital to shareholders through stock buybacks and dividend payments from the restaurant stock.
Darden's quarterly numbers looked pretty good. Sales climbed 6.4% to $2.8 billion, with same-restaurant sales climbing 4% year over year. LongHorn Steakhouse restaurants did the best within the Darden universe, seeing a 7.1% rise in comps, but the Olive Garden store concept also did well with a 4.4% rise. Segment profits for both LongHorn and Olive Garden were also higher, contributing to earnings of $2.58 per share that were up 15% from year-ago levels.
Darden boosted its quarterly dividend by 8% to $1.31 per share. It also repurchased about 200,000 shares during the quarter, spending $35 million and leaving more than $650 million in its repurchase authorization.
The outlook for fiscal 2024 included same-restaurant comps growth of 2.5% to 3.5%, revenue of $11.5 billion to $11.6 billion, and adjusted earnings of $8.55 to $8.85 per share. Those numbers might not have been quite as robust as some shareholders had wanted to see, but they still indicate solid and consistent gains even in a challenging economic environment.
