Why Is Intuit Stock Falling? INTU Beat Earnings but Guidance Did the Damage

Intuit (Nasdaq: INTU) reported fourth-quarter results after the close on 25 August and beat on both revenue and profit — and the stock fell anyway. Shares dropped 8.69% in after-hours trading and were down roughly 11.8% before the open. The trigger was not the quarter that ended; it was the guidance for fiscal 2027.

• Q4 revenue of $4.35 billion, up 14% year over year, against a $4.27 billion consensus.
• Adjusted earnings of $4.03 per share versus $3.59 expected.
• Fiscal 2027 revenue growth guided to 9–10%, down from 14% in fiscal 2026.
• Online paying customer growth slowed to 3% year over year.

Intuit cleared both headline numbers. Full-year revenue reached $21.45 billion, growing 14%. On its own, that result does not explain a double-digit drawdown in a fundamentally screened large-cap software name.

Fourth quarter	Reported	Consensus
Revenue	$4.35B (+14%)	$4.27B
Adjusted EPS	$4.03	$3.59

So why did the stock fall?

The break is in the outlook. Intuit guided fiscal 2027 revenue to $23.3–$23.5 billion, which works out to 9–10% growth — a clear step down from the 14% delivered in fiscal 2026. For a company trading on a growth multiple, a slower growth rate compresses the multiple before it touches a single dollar of profit.

Management also flagged weaker growth at Mailchimp, and online paying customer additions slowed to 3% year over year. Slower customer acquisition is the mechanism behind the revenue deceleration, not a separate problem.

The "huge EPS miss" is mostly an accounting change

The number driving headlines is this: Intuit guided fiscal 2027 adjusted EPS to $22.88–$23.12 against a $27.30 consensus. Reading that as a 16% miss is wrong, because the two figures do not measure the same thing.

Starting in the first quarter of fiscal 2027, Intuit no longer excludes share-based compensation from its adjusted measures. There is $5.81 per share of that expense embedded in the guidance. The consensus was built on the old definition, which excluded it.

FY2027 adjusted EPS	Figure	Share-based comp
Company guidance (new basis)	$22.88–$23.12	included
Analyst consensus (old basis)	$27.30	excluded
Guidance + comp (like for like)	$28.69–$28.93	comparable

Put on the same basis, the guidance sits above consensus rather than below it. The same distortion explains most of the gap between the $2.44–$2.48 first-quarter guide and the $4.02 the street had modelled. The real story is the revenue deceleration, not a collapse in profitability.

What happens next

Three things to watch: whether customer growth recovers from 3%, whether Mailchimp returns to growth, and where the first reported quarter under the new definition lands within guidance. Year-over-year comparisons will need care for the next four quarters because the reporting basis changed mid-stream.