Intuit, Inc. (INTU) has a significant opportunity to increase its market share in the personal finance market with Microsoft (MSFT) recently announcing plans to exit its personal finance program. MSFT has been one of the prime competitors in recent times for INTU, which creates small business accounting, personal finance and tax preparation software for accountants, small businesses and consumers.

Microsoft’s exit should significantly help Intuit's small business arena. The company earlier announced the acquisition in June 2009 of online payroll services provider PayCycle Inc for about $170 million. PayCycle specializes in serving small businesses, accountants and financial institutions and has more than 85,000 small-business users.

PayCycle will be integrated into Intuit's small business group. We believe the acquisition makes sense as it expands the company’s footprint -- extending access to PayCycle's portfolio of financial-institutional and small-business clients, among which are Capital One (COF) and PNC Bank (PNC). The

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Intuit Inc.: Shares Climb on Strong Q3 ResultsShares of Intuit Inc. (INTU, Hold) are up over 8% in trading so far today, bucking the trend of steep decline in the broader markets. The company posted an EPS beat in the traditionally strong Q3 and narrowed its guidance range going forward, indicating better visibility into Q4.Q3 revenue upside was driven by better-than-expected results in QuickBooks, Accounting Professionals, FI's, and Other Businesses, offsetting weakness in the Consumer Tax segment. The non-GAAP EPS beat was mainly attributable to higher gross margins and effective cost-control measures.Intuit offers small business accounting, personal finance and tax preparation software for accountants, small businesses and consumers. Q3 non-GAAP EPS of $1.68 came widely ahead of our $1.58 estimate (consensus was at $1.61), while revenues of $1.434 billion also came ahead of our $1.1420 billion estimate.FY2009 guidance range was ...

Intuit Inc. (INTU, Hold) issued its fiscal Q209 results yesterday after the bell. Although year-over-year comparisons were negative, both for revenue and EPS, the company beat both our and consensus expectations by a comfortable margin. Q3 and full-year guidance was also softened considerably, particularly at the bottom line, reflecting the management’s concern of the softening economic environment. Nevertheless, the stock traded up sharply after the market close yesterday and is up nearly 12% so far today.The tax preparation software maker’s EPS beat came mainly from tight cost control, although operating income as a percentage of revenues fell nearly 5.2% on a year-over-year basis. Part of this decline was attributed to a deference of approx. $70 million of revenue from its top-selling TurboTax tax-preparation software to the 3rd quarter because of a change in the way it priced the product. Without the change in revenue timing, non-GAAP …