earnings

With Steve Ballmer having issued sharp words on Yahoo across Europe this week, it was not a surprise to see Microsoft take a hard line on its Yahoo bid Thursday.

In its just-completed conference call with analysts, Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell said the company has seen no good reason to up its bid.

Liddell said Yahoo continues to lose search share and see profitability decline.

"We've yet to see tangible evidence that our bid substantially undervalues the company," Chris Liddell said. "In fact, we have seen the opposite."

Of course, Yahoo also talked tough on Tuesday … Read more

Check back here for updates from Microsoft's call with financial analysts following their earnings report. We'll be updating this blog as new information comes to light. You can see how they did here.

3:33 p.m.: That's it for the call. Reflecting back, the two issues that struck me the most were the hard line on Yahoo and the piracy issue. I'll have more to say on both fronts in the next little bit.

3:31 p.m.: Finally, an analyst notes that the biggest disappointment in the quarter seemed to be Windows revenue and … Read more

Updated 2:02 PM PDT to reflect after-hours trading of Microsoft stock.

Microsoft on Thursday reported quarterly earnings that edged past analysts' estimates, but revenue came in slightly below what some analysts had been expecting. On the plus side, the company's profit forecast for next year is higher than some analysts were projecting.

The software maker reported earnings of 47 cents per share, on revenue of $14.45 billion, for the three months ended March 31. That compares to analysts' estimates of 44 cents per share, on revenue of $14.5 billion, according to Thomson Reuters. The results include … Read more

For several quarters, Microsoft has been seeing a drop in piracy rates, which has been helping fuel improved business in its Windows unit. In the just-reported March quarter, however, Microsoft saw an increased rate of piracy, an executive told CNET News.com on Thursday.

In an interview, Colleen Healy, Microsoft's general manager of investor relations, said that the number of unlicensed PCs, particularly in Asia, increased during the company's third quarter. That was one of the factors that caused the Windows unit to come in shy of what the company had forecast.

"Q3 was a tough quarter … Read more

With Yahoo's earnings out of the way, all eyes will be on Redmond Thursday afternoon as Microsoft issues its quarterly earnings report.

Any mention of Yahoo is sure to draw attention, though we're unlikely to get more in posturing than we have already gotten this week in appearances across the globe from CEO Steve Ballmer.

Microsoft will also be watched closely for its comments on the macroeconomic picture as well as any change to its expectations for the PC market or business spending on technology.

Of course, some people may tune in just to see how Microsoft itself … Read more

Here's a Bloomberg News video link that captures Ballmer's presentation Wednesday, in which he discusses the possibility of Microsoft walking away from its Yahoo offer.

Yahoo shares headed a bit south when markets opened Wednesday, as analysts posted lackluster reviews on its first-quarter results and, in at least one case, lowered recommendations.

Adding a drag on its stock performance were comments Wednesday from Microsoft's chief executive, Steve Ballmer, who said the software giant is unlikely to raise its buyout bid for the Internet pioneer and is "prepared to move forward alone without Yahoo,&… Read more

The following is a record of a live report of Yahoo's conference call with financial analysts discussing the company's first-quarter results.

2:01 p.m. PDT: The call is getting started. For background, here's a link to Yahoo's financial results for the first quarter of 2008. To recap, Yahoo's net income was essentially flat, excluding a gain from its stake in business-to-business site Alibaba, but revenue excluding commissions paid to partners rose 14 percent to $1.532 billion.

2:02 p.m.: It's starting.

2:07 p.m.: Chief Executive Jerry Yang: "We … Read more

Yahoo's first-quarter net income increased dramatically, but most of the gain was from a noncash gain from the search engine's stake in Chinese Web site Alibaba.

The company reported net income of $542 million for the quarter, compared with $142 million for the same period a year ago. Excluding $401 million related to the initial public offering of Alibaba.com, the business-to-business division of Alibaba, net income slid $1 million.

However, excluding that and other factors, the company reported earnings per share of 11 cents, 2 cents above what analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial expected on average.

Excluding … Read more

Attention Microhoo watchers: We'll be live-blogging Yahoo's conference call for the company's first-quarter results.

Yahoo releases financial results sometime after 1 p.m. PDT, but the conference call with financial analysts--where the juicier quotations usually surface--starts at 2 p.m. PDT.

If you're keeping score, analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial expect, on average, earnings of 9 cents per share on revenue of $1.324 billion.