Barnes & Noble Shares Fall After Profits And Sales Slip

Barnes & Noble Inc. shares fell 3% in Thursday premarket trading after the retailer reported third-quarter profit that missed expectations. Net income was $70.3 million, or 96 cents per share, down from $80.3 million, or $1.04 last year. The FactSet consensus was $1.13. Sales totaled $1.30 billion, down from $1.41 billion last year but just ahead of the $1.29 billion FactSet consensus. Same-store sales fell 8.3%, largely due to lower traffic and a decline in coloring books, artist supplies and the best-selling Adele album that was released in 2015. Those three items accounted for nearly one-third of the sales decline. Barnes & Noble said "trends softened" in late January and into the fourth quarter, so the company now expects full-year 2017 same-store sales to decline about 7%. Barnes & Noble shares are down 3.2% for the last year while the S&P 500 index is up 20.6% for the same period.

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