Oracle had a disappointing third quarter with revenue as flat as a Paris supermodel and lower profit as the US dollar strengthened.
To put some shine on the gloom for investors, Oracle raised its quarterly dividend 25 percent to 15 cents a share.
As a result shares of Oracle initially fell but quickly rose 3.3 percent in after-hours trading to $43.20.
The database company reported sales of $9.3 billion, the same as the quarter a year ago. Oracle said revenue for the fiscal third quarter would have risen 6 percent without the impact of unfavorable currency rates.
The cocaine nose jobs of Wall Street had expected $9.46 billion.
Oracle has been pressing ahead on its glorious quest to make computers out of clouds.
Oracle said its cloud-computing software and platform service revenue rose 30 percent to $372 million, an area keenly watched by investors as Oracle tries to migrate its business toward a remote, Internet-enabled model.
Analysts say that the plan is turning out OK, and certainly not as bad as they had expected.
Oracle’s net profit fell slightly to $2.49 billion from $2.56 billion in the year-ago quarter.
