Shares of Home Depot Inc.
HD,
shed 1.8% in premarket Tuesday, after the home improvement retail giant reported fiscal fourth-quarter same-U.S. store sales that missed expectations and provided a downbeat full-year outlook, but raised its dividend by 7.7%. Net income for the quarter to Jan. 28 fell to $2.8 billion, or $2.82 a share, from $3.36 billion, or $3.30 a share, in the year-ago period, to beat the FactSet consensus of $2.77. Sales fell 2.9% to $34.79 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $34.64 billion. Overall same-store sales, or sales from stores open at least a year, decreased 3.5% and U.S. same store sales declined 4.0%, while the FactSet consensus for both overall and U.S. same-store sales was for a decline of 3.6%. For fiscal 2024, the company expects EPS growth of about 1%, while the current FactSet consensus of $15.57 implies 3.0% growth. The company is expecting sales to increase 1% and same-store sales to be down 1%, while the FactSet consensus is for sales implies a 1.4% rise and same-store sales are expected to slip 0.4%. Separately, the company raised its quarterly dividend to $2.25 a share from $2.09 a share, with the new dividend payable March 21 to shareholders of record on March 7. The stock has rallied 17.6% over the past three months through Friday, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
has advanced 9.9%.
