Salesforce sees earnings surge past $5 billion

Salesforce’s quarterly revenue exceeded $5 billion for the first time despite challenges from the coronavirus pandemic, sending its stock soaring.

The cloud computing company, which is San Francisco’s largest privatesector employer, reported revenue of $5.15 billion for the three months ending in July, up from $4 billion in the previous year. The results beat Wall Street expectations, with analysts surveyed by Zacks expecting revenue of $4.9 billion. Net income was $2.63 billion.

The company’s stock surged around 13% in afterhours trading.

CEO Marc Benioff said it was “humbling” and “bittersweet” to have strong earnings despite the coronavirus pandemic. The company is allowing employees to continue working

from home until at least August 2021, which affects more than 9,000 San Francisco workers.

“We’re in a new world. We’re in an alldigital world with the work digitally, we’re living digitally, we’re educating digitally,” he said.

The company raised its annual guidance to between $20.7 billion to $20.8 billion in sales, up from $20 billion. On Monday, the company was added to the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

For the current quarter ending in November, Salesforce expects its pershare earnings to range from 73 cents to 74 cents.

The company expects revenue in the range of $5.24 billion to $5.25 billion for the fiscal third quarter. Analysts surveyed by Zacks had expected revenue of $5.01 billion.