Did anyone ever say that the cloud revenue would replace the lost on-premise revenue? Analysts are just assuming that growth will continue unabated throughout the transition to a cloud services company. Well, I guess LMS are saying that revenues will remain flat or slightly down, I can't remember exactly what the last guidance was. If we stopped on-prem right now, revenues would drop but we'd show commitment to completing the change to a cloud services company and the company would be in a better position for future growth. Hitting a reset button is not without pain. Earnings per share will drop but if there are fewer shares, that will cushion the blow. Maybe buying back if you are going to completely restructure a company is a good idea? Of course this is all just an j educated guess.
Some valid points here by @Yh7AY1w-lbq .