Best Buy Reports Drop in Same-Store Sales, Shares Sink

BEST-BUY-CANADA

Best Buy, the No. 1 U.S. electronics retailer, reported an unexpected decline in holiday-quarter same-store sales on Wednesday, hurt by weak demand for tablets, gaming consoles, wearable devices and mobile phones.

The company's sales at stores open for more than a year fell 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter, widely missing analysts' average estimate of an increase of 0.5 percent, according to research firm Consensus Metrix.

Net revenue fell 1 percent to $13.48 billion, missing the average analyst estimate of $13.62 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The company's shares fell more than 9 percent in premarket trading.

(Reporting by Richa Naidu in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D'Souza)