Shares of Lowe’s Companies LOW, -5.80% rose 1.0% in premarket trading Wednesday, after the home improvement retailer reported fiscal second-quarter profit, sales and same-store sales that beat expectations, and provided an upbeat full-year outlook. Net income for the quarter to July 30 rose to $3.02 billion, or $4.25 a share, from $2.83 billion, or $3.74 a share, in the year-ago period. The FactSet consensus for earnings per share was $4.01. Sales grew 1.0%, to $27.57 billion from $27.30 billion, while the FactSet consensus was for a decline to $26.74 billion, as digital sales rose 7%. Cost of sales increased 1.4% to $18.26 billion, to bring gross margin down to 33.78% from 34.08%. Overall same-store sales fell 1.6%, to beat the FactSet consensus of a 2.2% decline, while U.S. same-store sales were down 2.2% to beat expectations of a 2.6% decline. For fiscal 2021, the company expects revenue of “approximately $92 billion,” above the FactSet consensus of $91.4 billion, and sees gross margin “up slightly.” The stock has had slipped 5.4% over the past three months through Tuesday, while shares of rival Home Depot Inc. HD, -4.27% has gained 1.3% and the S&P 500 SPX, -0.71% has tacked on 7.8%.
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