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 Violin Memory Inc (NYSE: VMEM) were down 11.5% as of 11:15 a.m. Wednesday after the company released disappointing first-quarter results.
So what: Quarterly revenue fell 33% year over year to $12.1 million, which translated to an adjusted net loss of $21.2 million, or $0.22 per share. Analysts, on average, were anticipating a narrower adjusted net loss of $0.20 per share on significantly higher revenue of $21.4 million.
"Our first quarter results were unsatisfactory," explained Violin Memory CEO Kevin DeNuccio, "as we continued to experience the short-term effects of transitioning customers to our new Flash Storage Platform solutions."
Now what: DeNuccio added, "We believe that this transitional headwind is now beginning to subside, and we are off to the strongest quarterly start to date with recognizable revenue already approaching 90% of our first quarter total."
As a result -- and with the caveat that DeNuccio called this "very cautious" in the subsequent conference call -- Violin Memory anticipates current-quarter revenue of $16 million to $20 million. Wall Street was modeling higher second-quarter revenue of $22.9 million.
In the end, I can't blame the market for so aggressively bidding down Violin Memory stock today given it's quarterly miss and conservative guidance. Though there's a chance Violin Memory might well be underpromising with that guidance, I'm content continuing to watch the company's progress from the sidelines during this transition.
