Investing.com -- Shares in H&R Block Inc (NYSE:HRB) ticked up in after-hours trading after the largest tax preparation company in the U.S. topped analysts' expectations and increased its quarterly dividend by 10% on Thursday.
For the period which ended on April 30, the Kansas City-based company reported net profit of $700.7 million or 3.13 per share, in comparison with $738.8 million or 2.66 per share a year earlier. At the same time, H&R Block revenue fell 0.2% to $2.3 billion, amid across-the-board decline in return volume over this year's tax season. During Tax Season 2016, H&R Block suffered a 5.8% decline in assisted returns and a decrease of 2.6% in returns from company-designed software, leading to a dip of 4.5% in total returns. Analysts expected to see per share earnings of 3.15 on revenue of $2.28 billion.
"As I said in April, this season's results are not acceptable," said Bill Cobb, H&R Block's president and chief executive officer. "We are ready to move on. Going forward, we are committed to arresting the client decline and ultimately achieving client growth. We are developing aggressive plans for tax season 2017 that we believe will enable us to achieve this objective."
In the meantime, H&R Block upped its quarterly dividend 0.02 to 0.22 payable to shareholders of record on June 20. Moving forward, the company plans on rolling out a host of cost savings initiatives and developing innovative solutions before the start of next year's tax season.
"I'm excited about the future for this company and the plans we are working on for next tax season," said Cobb. "These plans will challenge us to think differently about certain parts of our business, while building on those areas of the business in which we were successful, such as pricing, mix, improved product attach levels, and the successful launch of our new Block Advisors brand."
Shares in H&R Block rose 0.53 or 2.52% to 21.60 in after-hours trading.