Computerworld | Jun 20, 2014 7:06 AM PT

Larry puts on a brave face.

Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) stock dropped like a stone after the markets closed yesterday. Results show the company actually losing money last quarter. Why? Mumble-mumble. something to do with the Venezuelan bolívar, mumble-mumble .

From a median day price of $42.73, shares dived to a low of $38.96, before slowly recovering some ground. At the time of writing, the price is again moving south of $39.90.

In IT Blogwatch. bloggers believe the real reason is the ever-onward march to the cloud.

Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment.

Who can report this news for us? Chris Kanaracus can:

Oracle. fourth-quarter profits slipped slightly. Net income fell 4 percent.

But SaaS (software-as-a-service) and PaaS (platform-as-a-service) revenue rose 25 percent. and IaaS (infrastructure-as-a-service) sales jumped 13 percent. Oracle is now the second largest SaaS company in the world, CEO Larry Ellison said. Cloud subscription fees don’t bring in as much money up front. but over time they end up being more lucrative, Ellison said. In the long term, we make much, much more money.  MORE

And Dina Bass makes her own fishing puns: [She’s fired -Ed.]

Oracle. profit and sales fell short of analysts’ estimates [as] cloud-computing rivals lure customers away.

The database and business-software maker, which has relied on acquisitions to fuel growth, has seen the benefits of those deals peter out. Ellison is nearing a deal to buy Micros Systems. according to people familiar with the matter. Oracle and Micros, a provider of software for hotels and restaurants, are in exclusive talks.

“This is a shocker for investors who were expecting a slight beat in the quarter. [It’s] clear the company has a lot of heavy lifting in front of it,” said Daniel Ives, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets.  MORE

So Jack Clark watches the ticker:

Oracle’s shares dropped sharply after the database giant reported results that – yet again – missed analysts’ expectations. Earnings-per-share [were] $0.92. missing analyst expectations of. $0.95.

Oracle sought to reassure investors that it is rolling with the changes rippling through the tech market. In the past year, Oracle has reacted to the threats posed to its business by the rise of both cloud computing and upstart database technologies. It has also thrown more money at specific software-as-a-service products, such as marketing cloud acquisition Eloqua. and has partnered with Salesforce, Netsuite, and Microsoft to help it sell its software.

[But that’s] not nearly. enough to offset the stagnation in Oracle’s core business. Judging by the brutal fall in its share price. the company will have to persuade investors it can find some way to grow. As we’ve said before, the problem Oracle faces is that the business model required [for] cloud computing. is not the same as [for] high-margin and reliable recurrent revenue.  MORE

Meanwhile, Rachel King is the queen of the minutiae:

[Oracle] attributed part of the problem to a non-operating loss caused by exchange rate changes in Venezuela.

As a result, Oracle shares started to tumble by as much as [8.8] percent in after-hours trading.  MORE

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