Technology stocks pared some of their earlier declines but stalled short of positive territory, with the SPDR Technology Select Sector ETF (XLK) falling 0.6% while the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index slid 1.2% in Friday trading.
In company news, Zscaler (ZS) dropped nearly 11% after the cloud security company said its billings growth during its current FY23 that started in August will likely slow from prior-year levels due to longer sales cycles and extending past its normal range of 10 to 14 months. It now sees calculated billing rising 30% to 31% during the 12 months ending July 31 compared with its 59% increase during FY22, according to a Capital IQ transcript of the company's post-earnings conference call with analysts Thursday night.
Asana (ASAN) also dropped almost 11% after forecasting Q4 revenue in a range of $144 million to $146 million, lagging the Capital IQ consensus expecting the work management software firm to generate $151.1 million in revenue for the three months ending in late January.
To the upside, UiPath (PATH) rose over 12% after late Thursday reporting a surprise Q3 profit of $0.05 per share, excluding one-time items, improving on the break-even quarter for the automation software firm during the year-ago quarter and beating the Capital IQ consensus expecting a normalized net loss of $0.01 per share. Revenue increased 19% year-over-year, growing to $262.7 million and also topping the $255.9 million analyst mean.
Samsara (IOT) gained nearly 20% after the cloud software company narrowed its non-GAAP Q3 net loss from year-ago levels, exceeding analyst estimates, while revenue for the three months ended Oct. 29 increased 49% year-over-year to $169.8 million and beating analyst estimates by $14.4 million. Samsara also trimmed its projected FY23 net loss and raised its revenue forecast for the 12 months ending Jan. 31.