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$INFY,...Infosys closes near $63; Sikka talks M&A, tech investments

Though the Nasdaq fell 2.3%, Infosys (INFY +5.7%) posted big gains thanks to its FQ2 beat and FY15 revenue guidance reiteration. Shares made a fresh 52-week high of $63.56 before pulling back a bit.

Arihant Capital likes what it heard from the IT outsourcing giant. "Management has indicated faster decision making by clients helped the company grow faster ... It has also indicated increased traction in areas of cloud computing, mobile technology, energy."

New CEO Vishal Sikka used the day to declare Infosys will "embark on an active inorganic acquisition strategy, not to achieve growth, but to focus on acquiring core capabilities." Infosys, which had $5.4B in cash at the end of September, has historically shied away from big acquisitions.

Sikka, until recently a senior product exec at SAP, also promises big internal investments in new technologies, as Infosys tries to cut its dependence on slow-growing commodity outsourcing services (hurt by a secular shift towards cloud services spending).

Among other things, he proclaims Infosys is planning to build an analytics platform for enterprises that will cost "a fraction of what previous-generation analytics platforms did."