The stock market has seen a lot of volatility recently, and part of the concern that many investors have is that they're not sure what to expect from the Federal Reserve. That could change on Friday, as Fed Chair Jerome Powell is expected to give a speech at a conference in Jackson Hole that could shed some light on monetary policy both now and down the road. Stock index futures climbed in premarket trading Friday morning as investors anticipated good news on that front.
In addition, many companies have released their quarterly financial reports in recent weeks. Nasdaq stocks Affirm Holdings (AFRM 5.31%) and Workday (WDAY -1.19%) added their names to that list, and their respective share prices are moving higher on Friday morning. Read on to find out why.
Affirm climbs as consumers stay relatively strong
Shares of Affirm Holdings jumped 8% in premarket trading Friday morning. The buy now, pay later specialist reported fiscal fourth-quarter financial results for the period ended June 30, and investors were generally pleased with how well consumers are holding up in being able to pay off their debt obligations.
Affirm's financial metrics had a lot of positives. Revenue climbed 22% year over year to $446 million, with gross merchandise volume rising at a 25% rate to $5.5 billion. Affirm had 16.5 million active consumers, up by 2.5 million over the past 12 months, and transactions per customer increased 30% from year-ago levels.
Investors were pleased to see strength in several key consumer categories. General merchandise spending and travel showed extraordinary growth rates, while fashion and beauty remained a key driver of Affirm's expansion. Just about the only area of weakness was in active merchant counts, which rose only 8% from where they were a year ago.
Affirm is trying to stay focused on offering credit to consumers and creating attractive assets in which its funding partners can invest. With levels of buying activity remaining solid even in times of macroeconomic stress, Affirm believes it can keep innovating to offer more products that are useful to buyers, merchants, and investors.
Workday gets to work
Shares of Workday were up about 4% before the market opened on Friday morning. The provider of cloud-based finance and HR software reported fiscal second-quarter financial results for the period ended July 31 that showed the continued willingness of business clients to keep paying for software-as-a-service subscriptions.
Workday reported a 16% rise in revenue year over year to $1.79 billion, with subscription-based revenue climbing at a slightly faster 19% rate. Adjusted net income soared 74% to $378 million, and that produced adjusted earnings of $1.43 per share.
Revenue backlog figures were also strong, pointing to the ability of Workday's business clients to commit to longer-term arrangements for access to software products. Total subscription revenue backlog jumped 32.5% to $17.85 billion, with more than 65 million users having access to Workday software currently.
Workday sees its customer base continuing to expand, and co-founder/co-CEO Aneel Bhusri pointed to the company's leadership in artificial intelligence and machine learning as integral components of its future success. With generative AI capabilities already in development and expected to launch in the next month, Workday is moving forward aggressively to stay ahead of the curve in technological innovation. That's a big part of the company's boost in subscription revenue guidance for the full year to between $6.57 billion and $6.59 billion, and it explains why shareholders are getting even more excited about Workday's promise.
