JD Edwards turns in loss for first time

Enterprise application vendor JD Edwards has warned analysts that it will post a loss for its most recent quarter.

The loss, the first in its history, is expected to be about $25 million, but that will depend on the final revenue announcement. Revenue is expected to be in the range of between $215 million and $225 million, representing growth of between three and 12 per cent.

The company will post full details of its financial results later this month.

Recently, JD Edwards' shares have been recovering from a low of $11.06 to about $14 but at the close of trade last week, they were down to $12.25.

Chuck Phillips, analyst at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, recently issued a revised forecast for the year when he said JD Edwards would come in at about $0.13 per share profit for the year, compared with $0.59 last year.

JD Edwards blamed the general downturn in application sales. Trevor Salomon, northern Europe marketing director at JD Edwards, said: 'I guess it's a disappointment, but this is a year where companies are going to have to ride it out. We have more than $500 million in cash and near cash equivalents - we're still strong.'

But analysts are seeing mixed responses in the market. Mairi Johnson, researcher at Lehman Brothers, said: 'The companies are all blaming millennium issues, but on a sample of 40 customers in this market, there is a very mixed reaction. Some are buying and some have bolted the door until year 2000 is out of the way.'

Meanwhile, SAP recently surprised the market by bucking the trend, saying it would finish 1999 with revenue up between 20 per cent and 25 per cent.

See feature, page 57.