Concur Technologies Shares Plunged

Although we do not believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What Shares of software as a-service provider Concur Technologies (Nasdaq: CNQR) slid as much as 13% in intraday trading as investors reacted to the company's fiscal fourth-quarter earnings and outlook.

So what Concur's performance in the fourth quarter showed that the company is continuing to build its position in the corporate travel market. Revenue of $77.5 million was up 20% from last year while non GAAP earnings per share rose a penny to $0.19. Sales were above analysts' expectations and earnings per share matched estimates. The company also highlighted some other positive did you know? items, like a commissioned Forrester study that showed the company's expense tracking suite delivers a 242 percent ROI over three years, as well as spot at No. 37 on Forbes' list of "America's Best Small Companies in 2010."

Now what: Unfortunately, the good news didn't spill over to the company's first-quarter outlook. Revenue growth of 17 percent and non GAAP earnings per share of $0.18 were both short of what Wall Street was hoping to see in the upcoming quarter. Worse still, the announcement came on a particularly bad day, as Mr. Market was put on edge by a disappointing outlook from tech giant Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO). The reaction to the earnings outlook may have been a bit knee-jerk, but investors will still need to see the company crank up the growth engine particularly on the bottom line if they hope to justify the stock's current valuation.