Home Depot earnings preview: What to expect in Q1?

The Home Depot (HD) is scheduled to report its earnings results for the first quarter of 2019 on Tuesday before the market closes. The home improvement retailer will be benefited by spectacular growth strategies, including an interconnected strategy and focus on Pro customers.

The results will be driven by the smooth execution of the integrated retail strategy that connects offline and online channels. The enhanced digital sales are likely to be driven by the progress on the efforts. For picking up online orders, Home Depot continued to roll out automated lockers in its stores.

Home Depot will be aided by positive customer response for assortments as well as enhancements to drive integrated shopping experience. The company could be aided by robust customer demand in the home improvement markets that would drive strength across store operations.

The quarter could be hurt by soft sales and comparable store sales, which is likely to be negatively impacted by currency headwinds due to strong US dollar and commodity price inflation. The hurricane-related sales in the prior year quarter could reduce the top line growth difference for the first quarter.

The comps are likely to be largely impacted by lowering demand arising from unexpected wet winter weather in all regions throughout the quarter.

Also read: Walmart Q1 earnings report

Analysts expect the company’s earnings to rise by 5.30% to $2.19 per share and revenue will increase by 5.80% to $26.39 billion for the first quarter. In comparison, during the previous year quarter, Home Depot reported a profit of $2.08 per share on revenue of $24.95 billion.

The company has surprised investors by beating analysts’ expectations in the past four quarters. It is expected that Home Depot could post upbeat results for the first quarter. Majority of the analysts recommended a “strong buy” or “buy” rating while expecting the stock to reach $205.86 per share in the next 52 weeks.

For the fourth quarter, Home Depot reported a 32% jump in earnings helped by an 11% growth in revenue and a 3.7% increase in comparable sales. The bottom line was hit by a pre-tax charge of about $247 million due to impairment losses regarding certain trade names at Interline Brands.

For fiscal 2019, the company expects comp sales growth of about 5% and sales growth of about 3.3%. Five new stores are expected to open in the year, with a gross margin of about 34%. Earnings are expected to grow 3.1% to about $10.03 per diluted share.

Shares of Home Depot has risen over 3% in the past year and over 14% in the year so far.

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