Lululemon Quarterly Profit Grows, But Full-Year View Misses Street

Yoga apparel retailer Lululemon Athletics (NASDAQ:LULU) beat expectations for the fourth-quarter on robust holiday sales but revealed a disappointing fiscal year outlook and narrowed margins.

The Vancouver, British Columbia-based store operator reported on Thursday net income of $73.9 million, or 51 cents, compared with $54.76 million, or 38 cents, in the year-earlier period.

The results were ahead of average analyst estimates of 49 cents in a Thomson Reuters poll.

Revenue for the three months ended Jan. 29 was $371.5 million, up 51.4% from $245.4 million a year ago, beating the Street’s view of $362.4 million.

The gains were led by a 26% improvement in comparable sales, and a 103% increase to $50.1 million in direct-to-consumer sales.

But gross profit margin slipped to 56.3% from 58.5%.

For the current quarter, Lululemon projects earnings of 28 cents to 29 cents a share on sales of $265 million to $270 million. Wall Street is looking for a profit of 29 cents on sales of $257 million.

In 2012, it expects to make between $1.50 and $1.57 a share on revenue of $1.3 billion to $1.33 billion. Analysts on average are anticipating earnings of $1.61 a share on sales of $1.31 billion.