Applied Materials (AMAT) shares soared more than 8% in extended trading on Thursday after the semiconductor equipment maker reported fiscal first-quarter results and guidance that topped Wall Street’s forecast.
For the period ending Jan. 25, Applied Materials said it earned an adjusted $2.38 per share as revenue came in at $7.01B, down 2.1% year-over-year. Semiconductor systems revenue was $5.14B, while applied global services revenue was $1.56B and other revenue was $312M.
Analysts had expected the company to earn an adjusted $2.21 per share on $6.87B in revenue.
“Applied Materials delivered strong results in our fiscal first quarter, fueled by the acceleration of industry investments in AI computing,” said Gary Dickerson, President and CEO. “The need for higher performance and more energy-efficient chips is driving high growth rates for leading-edge logic, high-bandwidth memory and advanced packaging. These are areas where Applied is the process equipment leader, and we expect to grow our semiconductor equipment business over 20 percent this calendar year.”
Looking ahead to the fiscal second-quarter, Applied Materials expects revenue to be between $7.15B and $8.15B, well above the $7.01B analysts expected. Adjusted earnings per share are forecast to be between $2.44 and $2.84 per share, also well above the $2.28 analysts anticipated.
The company will host a conference call at 4:30 p.m. EST to discuss the results.