Best Buy shares rise after earnings beat, guidance raised
Best Buy Co. Inc. stock rose 4.3% in Thursday premarket trading after the consumer electronics retailer reported fiscal first-quarter earnings that beat expectations and raised its full-year comparable sales guidance. Net income totaled $595.0 million, or $2.32 per share, up from $159.0 million, or 61 cents per share. Adjusted EPS of $2.23 far exceeded the FactSet consensus of $1.40. Revenue of $11.64 billion was up from $8.56 billion and ahead of the FactSet consensus of $10.40 billion. Comparable sales growth of 37.2% beat the FactSet consensus for 23.5% growth. Domestic comparable sales growth grew 37.9%. "The year has clearly started out much stronger than we originally expected," said Chief Financial Officer Matt Bilunas in a statement. "The sales momentum is continuing into Q2 and we are raising our annual comparable sales growth outlook. As we think about the back half of this year, we expect shopping behavior will evolve as customers are able to spend more time on activities like eating out, traveling and other events." For fiscal Q2, Best Buy expects comparable sales growth of 17%, and for the year, the company is guiding for growth of 3% to 6%, up from a 2% decline to 1% growth. The FactSet consensus is for Q2 growth of 6.1% and full-year growth of 2.3%. Best Buy stock has rallied 17.2% for the year to date, outpacing the benchmark S&P 500 index , which is up 11.7% for the period.
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