Cisco FY Q2 Revenue in Line, EPS Beats; Q3 View In-Line

Networking equipment titan Cisco Systems (CSCO) this afternoon reported fiscal Q2 revenue in line and earnings per share that topped consensus.

Revenue in the three months ended in January rose to $12.1 billion, yielding EPS of 51 cents.

Analysts had been modeling $12.1 billion and 48 cents a share.

CEO John Chambers was on CNBC just after the release, saying the the company “did what we said we would do,” and that the company is “very comfortable with our profit margins.”

Chambers said weakness in the federal sector was not as bad this quarter as in prior quarters. Chambers begged off of a question about the likelihood of being able to get tax breaks to repatriate cash domiciled overseas.

He said he was encouraged by what he described as President Obama‘s focus on returning the U.S. to growth, but that he expected a lot of the company’s investments would continue to be made overseas, even though “I’m a loyal American.”

Cisco’s stock is up 28 cents at $21.42 in late trading.

Cisco management will host a conference call with analysts at 4:30 pm, Eastern time, and you can catch the webcast of the event here.

Update: The stock has reversed course and is now down 31 cents, or 1.4%, at $20.83.

Update 2: On the call. The company projected Q3 revenue to rise 4% to 6%, year over year, and projected EPS in a range of 48 cents to 50 cents. That is in line with the average estimate of analysts for 5.5% growth and 49 cents per share. The stock is now up 6 cents at $21.28.

Cisco also detailed its results from individual lines of business. Sales of routing equipment was down 6%, year over year, at $1.95 billion. Sales of switching equipment rose 3% to $3.72 billion. Sales of video equipment for service providers rose 30% to $1.22 billion. Sales of collaboration equipment rose 11% to $945 million. Sales of data center gear rose 65% to $548 million. Sales of security products were up 1%, at $336 million, sales of wireless products were up 37% at $520 million, and products in the category of “Other” we’re down 29% at $198 million.