Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.
What: Shares of health-care information technology provider Allscripts Healthcare Solutions (MDRX -1.00%) rose as much as 15% after the company reported its fourth-quarter earnings results.
So what: Consider this one a complete head-scratcher because Allscripts results continued an ongoing theme of not being particularly good. For the quarter, Allscripts earned $0.16 per share as revenue fell 5% to $368 million. Wall Street estimates had called for a profit of $0.21 and revenue of $367.1 million. Total bookings grew 11% from the sequential third quarter, but fell by 45% from the year-ago period. According to Allscripts' CEO, Paul Black, "Our fourth quarter and 2012 financial results did not meet our expectations."
Now what: And Allscripts is rallying because...? Feel free to enlighten me, because this appears as confusing a move on a pretty bad earnings report as I've seen. Allscripts' strategic review didn't amount to a sale of the company, and I can only imagine that was because the interested parties didn't like what they saw with recent booking trends. Given Allscripts' struggles, I would strongly suggest looking elsewhere in the health-care IT sector.
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