Cybersecurity company Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. (Nasdaq: CHKP) opened the first quarter reporting season for Israeli companies traded on Wall Street today with positive results. The company beat analysts' estimates on both sales and profit, and came close to the upper end of the guidance it itself provided in the previous quarter.
Quarterly revenue totaled $508 million, representing growth of 4.3% in comparison with in the corresponding quarter of 2020. Revenue from security products and licenses totaled $387 million, up 6.6%, while revenue from software updates and maintenance rose 1.6% to $221 million.
On a GAAP basis, operating profit grew by 7.1% to $215 million, and the company posted a net profit of $183 million, which compares with $179 million in the corresponding quarter.
On a non-GAAP basis, net profit was $211 million, 2.6% higher than in the corresponding quarter. Earnings per share grew by 8.5% to $1.54, $0.04 above the consensus analysts' estimate, thanks to a reduction in the number of the company's shares resulting from its share buyback program. In the first quarter, Check Point bought back shares to the tune of $325 million, at an average price per share of $120.40, which is slightly higher than its current share price. Check Point has a market cap of $16.2 billion.
Check Point generated $375 million cash from regular activity in the first quarter of 2021, which compares with $395 million in the corresponding quarter of 2020. At the end of the quarter, the company had cash and investments valued at over $4 billion.
"We are pleased with our first quarter 2021 financial results. Revenues and non-GAAP earnings per share were toward the high-end of our guidance with CloudGuard bolstering this success with nice double-digit growth," said Check Point co-founder and CEO Gil Shwed. "The cyber threat landscape is reaching new levels of risk and requires a holistic security architecture to prevent the next cyber pandemic. Our Infinity architecture can uniquely address these needs and consolidate security for the user, the network and the cloud to prevent Gen V cyber-attacks."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on April 26, 2021
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