Crowdstrike shares slide despite beating expectations amid IT outage fallout
Shares in cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike tumbled over seven per cent in after-hours trading, even as the scandal-stricken company posted better than expected second-quarter earnings for its financial year 2025.
The Nasdaq-listed company, still reeling from last month’s global IT outage, posted total revenue of $963.9m (£729m), a 32 per cent increase from $731.6m (£553.3m) in the same period last year.
Subscription revenue, a key metric for the company, grew by 33 per cent to $918.3m (£694.5m), compared to $690m (£521.8m) in the second quarter of fiscal 2024.
Analysts had forecast revenue would hit $957.6m (£723.8m), with net income expected at $49.3m (£37.3m), or 19 cents (14 pence) per share, according to estimates compiled by Visible Alpha.
However, Crowdstrike slashed its full-year earnings guidance by about $86m (£65m) to $109m (£82.4m).
Crowdstrike chief executive George Kurtz said: “In response to rising point product complexity and an elevated threat environment, organisations are increasingly focused on consolidating their cybersecurity vendors into a streamlined platform that delivers better security outcomes, which is Crowdstrike Falcon. Our vision and mission of stopping breaches remains unchanged.”
Crowdstrike Falcon, the company’s flagship product, acts like an antivirus, using artificial intelligence and machine learning to detect and prevent threats.
But, on 19 July, a faulty software update to the product hit global tech systems worldwide, plunging them into technological darkness.
The so-called blue screen of death loop crippled Microsoft’s Windows operating system, grounding airlines, disrupting healthcare systems and banks and causing broadcasters to go off-air. Microsoft said the incident affected nearly 8.5m Windows devices.
The fallout has led to a series of lawsuits against Crowdstrike, which specialises in protecting computers and data from cyberattacks. In a bid to mitigate the damage, the Texas-based firm announced it would offer around $60m in credits to customers impacted by the outage.
Despite the outage, the company’s shares are up around 80 per cent over the past year and seven per cent year to date.