Software giant Microsoft Corp. has not changed its earnings expectations, but remains cautious amid the U.S. economic slowdown, Chief Financial Officer John Connors said on Friday. ``The expectations we set we haven't changed from our Jan. 18 earnings call, but as we mentioned in our October call and as we mentioned in our January call, we sell products and services around the globe and we are not immune to economic downturns,'' Connors told Reuters in an interview. Connors declined to elaborate on the earnings outlook for the Redmond, Wash.-based company. Earlier on Friday he told an investment conference in Seattle that he would not comment on the quarter and would not field questions about it. Microsoft, which makes the Windows computer operating system, in January lowered expectations slightly by saying profits for the fiscal third quarter, which ends on March 31, would come in at 42 cents to 43 cents a share. The current Wall Street consensus estimate is 43 cents a share, unchanged from the same quarter last year, according to First Call/Thomson Financial. It cited sluggish PC demand and a slowdown in technology spending by businesses. But it forecast in January that despite the slower quarter, profits for the full year would still be $1.80 to $1.82 a share.
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