SanDisk Profit Jumps 62%

(RTTNews) - Flash memory card maker SanDisk Corp. (SNDK) said Wednesday after the markets closed that its first quarter profit jumped 62% from last year, as revenue surged 13% and margin improved sharply.

The company's quarterly earnings per share, excluding items, also came in above analysts' expectations as did its quarterly revenue.

"We delivered record first quarter results, driven by 61 percent growth in our SSD revenue and strong retail performance," said Sanjay Mehrotra, president and chief executive officer of SanDisk. "We are excited by the momentum we are building in our business as we continue to execute on our growth initiatives."

SanDisk shares are currently gaining 6.16% in after hours trading after closing the day's regular trading session at $75.85, up 51 cents. The shares trade in a 52-week range of $50.68 to $85.37.

SanDisk makes removable cards, embedded flash products, USB flash drives and solid-state drives used in place of hard disk drives.

For the first quarter ended March 30, 2014, the Milpitas, California-based company reported net income of $268.9 million or $1.14 per share, compared to $166.2 million or $0.68 per share for the year-ago quarter.

Excluding items, adjusted net income for the first quarter was $330.0 million or $1.44 per share, compared to $206.9 million or $0.84 per share in the prior year quarter.

On average, 29 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to earn $1.25 per share for the first quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Gross margin for the quarter improved to 49.7% from 39.6% a year ago, while operating margin increased to 28.1% from 18.9% last year.

Revenue for the first quarter rose 13% to $1.51 billion from $1.34 billion in the same quarter last year. Thirty analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $1.49 billion for the first quarter.

SanDisk also declared its second quarter dividend of $0.225 per share, payable on May 27 to shareholders of record on May 5.