Why NQ Mobile Inc. Stock Plunged Today

What:Shares of NQ Mobile were down 15.7% as of 3:30 p.m. EST Tuesday after the Chinese Internet products company reported disappointing unaudited third-quarter results.

So what:Quarterly revenue rose 8.3% year over year to $87.9 million, and translated to a GAAP net loss of $2.5 million, or $0.03 per American depositary share. On an adjusted basis -- which means excluding things like share-based compensation -- net income came in at $905,000, or $0.01 per ADS, down from $6.4 million, or $0.07 per ADS, in the same year-ago period.

By comparison, NQ Mobile's guidance called for significantly higher third-quarter revenue of $110 million to $112 million. And analysts, on average, were modeling revenue near the high end of that range. NQ primarily blames the shortfall on lower hardware sales under its enterprise mobility segment.

More specifically, enterprise mobility revenue rose by 13% year over year to $39.1 million, driven entirely by 100% growth in software sales, and offset by a slight decline in hardware sales. Meanwhile, mobile value-added service revenue rose 25.4% to $31.5 million, advertising revenue declined 21.6% to $16 million, and other revenue rose to $1.4 million from $1.1 million in the same year-ago period.

Nonetheless, average monthly user accounts as of Sept. 30, 2015 rose 5.6% sequentially to 198.8 million. AndNQ Mobile CEO Zemin Xu insisted, "Our strict focus on cost controls and budgets continue to pay off in our results. Although hardware sales within our enterprise mobility segment performed below expectations, we are pleased to see progress in our entertainment and consumer businesses and see results from our efforts in the monetization of our traffic."

In addition, Xu noted the various "business divestitures previously announced are moving forward and accordingly, we continue to work on unlocking the value in these businesses." For perspective, between late August and the middle of November, NQ Mobile announced agreements to sell its FL Mobile, NationSky, and Beijing Tianya subsidiaries.

Now what: In the end, this was a disappointing showing from NQ Mobile, especially considering when it originally unveiled the largest of those divestitures in August,management outlined plans to hone their focus and significantly improve the enterprise division's sales and profit margins. If that wasn't enough, previous allegations of fraud and a subsequent executive exodus between late 2013 and earlier this year -- including both its co-CEOs, CFO, a handful of directors, and the company's audit committee chair-- are still more than enough to keep me away from this stock.

The article Why NQ Mobile Inc. Stock Plunged Today originally appeared on Fool.com.

Steve Symington has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.