NEW YORK (CNN/Money) -
J.C. Penney overcame flat holiday sales to report sharply improved fiscal fourth-quarter earnings Thursday that beat Wall Street expectations for the period, although the company warned on current period results.
In other retail results, Target Corp., the nation's No. 3 general retailer, reported a slight improvement in fourth-quarter earnings that met forecasts despite a decline in a key sales measure for the period.
Target (TGT: down $0.72 to $27.15, Research, Estimates) shares were down over 3 percent in late-morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
J.C. Penney (JCP: up $0.42 to $18.85, Research, Estimates), the department store and drugstore retailer earned $202 million, or 68 cents a share, from continuing operations for the period ended Jan. 25, up from 35 cents a share, excluding special items, a year earlier. Analysts surveyed by earnings tracker First Call had a consensus forecast of 66 cents.
Click here for a look at retail stocks
The company said it now expects fiscal first-quarter earnings per share in the low 30-cent range, which would be up from the 29 cents it earned a year earlier but below the 35-cent EPS forecast of First Call. Penney said it expects full-year EPS of $1.50 to $1.70. First Call has a consensus EPS forecast of $1.63 for the year, with a range of estimates from $1.50 to $2.00.
Revenue in the quarter totaled $9.5 billion, basically unchanged from a year earlier. Sales at stores open at least a year, a closely watched retail measure known as same-store sales, gained 1.9 percent in the department store unit and 2.5 percent at its Eckerd drugstore chain. Both gains were less than half those of the year earlier, and they were balanced out by a 20 percent decline in revenue from catalog sales.
Penney said in a conference call that it expects 2003 same-store sales at its department stores to be up 1 percent. The company also delivered quarterly guidance for the rest of 2003, saying it expects the second half to be much stronger than the first half. For the second quarter Penney sees earnings per share of about 8 cents, third-quarter earnings in the low-30 cents range, and fourth-quarter earnings in the mid-90 cents range.
Target hits target
Target earned $688 million, or 75 cents a diluted share, in the quarter ended Feb. 1, up from $658 million, or 72 cents, a year earlier. That was in line with the First Call forecast.
| Related stories
|
|
|
|
|
Revenue at Target, which operates stores under the Target, Marshall Field's and Mervyn's names, rose 6.4 percent to $14.1 billion, despite a 2.2 percent decline in same-store sales in the period. Revenue was helped by a nearly 50 percent increase in net credit revenue to $350 million.
The company did not give specific earnings per share guidance, although it said it anticipates continuing a 15 percent or better growth in EPS "over time." First Call's forecast for the current fiscal year earnings per share is $2.05, which would be a 13 percent gain from $1.81 a share in the just completed year.
In a conference call, Target said it expects same-store sales growth in 2003 of 3 to 4 percent and that Wall Street's forecast for $2.05 earnings per share for 2003 is "reasonable."
|
