Home Depot’s fourth-quarter performance was muted by ongoing caution from American consumers in a weak housing market, but the home improvement retailer topped Wall Street expectations.
The Atlanta company earned $2.57 billion, or $2.58 per share, for the three months ended Feb. 1. Stripping out one-time charges or benefits, earnings were $2.72 per share, topping analyst projections for per-share earnings of $2.53, according to FactSet.
A year earlier it earned $3 billion, or $3.02 per share.
An extra week in fiscal 2024 added approximately 30 cents per share to the year-ago quarter.
Home Depot’s stock rose more than 3% before the market opened on Tuesday.
Revenue totaled $38.2 billion, down from $39.7 billion a year earlier. The extra week in the prior-year period added about $2.5 billion of sales.
Wall Street was looking for revenue of $38.09 billion.
Sales at stores open at least a year, a key indicator of a retailer’s health, edged up 0.4%. In the U.S., comparable store sales climbed 0.3%.
Chair and CEO Ted Decker said in a statement that Home Depot’s quarterly results “were largely in-line with our expectations, reflecting the lack of storm activity in