HP Stocks Fell 5% Despite Decent Sales Performance

Ever since HP broke away from the more software-oriented Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, it has been struggling with slow computer sales. As such, it wasn’t too surprising that its stock prices fell 5 percent when it revealed its quarterly sales report. On the other hand, sales have remained relatively flat, which was apparently more than HP was predicting.

As Fortune notes, the PC market is in a steep decline right now, with people needing computers less and less thanks to the increase of mobile devices. With this in mind, it’s remarkable that HP was able to prevent a decline in sales at all.

Supposedly, HP was able to keep its PC business afloat thanks to the relatively high demand for high-end computers by video game enthusiasts. This contributed to the decent $11.9 billion quarterly revenue that the company was able to make, even though it is still a 4 percent drop year over year.

In any case, it would seem that HP is quite happy with the results, though company CEO Dion Weisler stresses that they are not going to just sit around while the boat is sinking.

“Although markets remain challenged, we have the innovation and executional rigor needed to continue to take profitable share and invest in the right opportunities to drive long-term success for the company,” he said.

Unfortunately, it would seem that the forecast for Q4 is looking bleak. By that point, revenue could be sitting at just 34 to 37 cents per share, Forbes report. This is below what Wall Street was expecting, which was at 41 cents per share.

This grim prediction will likely not sit well with investors, who are already feeling nervous about HP’s prospects. With printer sales down 14 percent year over year, innovation might be the last thing on their minds. Even so, plenty of investors are still looking at the company for a good opportunity to make decent returns in a market mired by stagnant prospects.