Intuit Inc. (NASDAQ: INTU) stock rose 1.32% (As of 9:33 AM GMT-4 on 24th August, 2018; Source: Google finance) after the company reported better than expected results for the fourth quarter 2018. Meanwhile, INTU announced that Brad Smith, current president, chief executive officer and chairman of the board, will step down as CEO at the end of December 2018. The company has appointed Sasan Goodarzi, currently executive vice president and general manager of Intuit’s Small Business and Self-Employed Group, to succeed him effective Jan. 1, 2019. Goodarzi will also be joining Intuit’s Board of Directors at that time. Further, Chief Technology Officer Tayloe Stansbury will step down Jan. 1, 2019. Marianna Tessel, senior vice president and chief product development officer for Intuit’s Small Business and Self-Employed Group, will succeed Stansbury as Intuit’s CTO. Under Smith, the company more than doubled its customer base to approximately 50 million customers, doubled its revenue to nearly $6 billion and more than tripled GAAP earnings per share.
INTU in the fourth quarter of FY 18 has reported the adjusted earnings per share of 32 cents, beating the analysts’ estimates for the adjusted earnings per share of 23 cents. The company had reported the adjusted revenue growth of 17.3 percent to $988 million in the fourth quarter of FY 18, beating the analysts’ estimates for revenue of $952 million. Revenue growth was fueled by 18% growth in the Small Business and Self-Employed Group and 14% growth in the Consumer Group.
Moreover, Online ecosystem revenue grew 43% in the fourth quarter and 40% for the fiscal year, exceeding our projects to grow better from 30%. We added over 1 million QuickBooks Online subscribers in fiscal year 2018 exceeding with more than 3.4 million subscribers, a 43% increase year-over-year. Growth remains strong across multiple geographies with U.S. subscribers growing 38% to approximately 2.6 million and international subscribers growing 62% to over 800,000. Within QuickBooks Online, Self-Employed subscribers grew to nearly 720,000, up from roughly 390,000 just one year ago. The company continue to expect online ecosystem revenues to see 30% growth year-over-year, the subscriber base beginning to moderate some as the company shift the emphasis in the next chapter of the business model evolution.
Additionally, Consumer revenues grew 14% in FY18 as the innovation drove customer and revenue growth, and the company made encouraging progress behind each of the strategic priorities. In the Strategic Partner Group, the professional tax revenue was slightly ahead of the expectations as revenue grew 4% in FY18