Home Depot quarterly profit, sales rise

A nascent recovery in the housing market helped Home Depot Inc report higher quarterly sales and earnings on Tuesday, prompting the world's largest home improvement chain to boost its sales outlook for the year.

Net earnings rose to $1.2 billion, or 83 cents a share, in the first quarter ended on May 5 from $1 billion, or 68 cents a share, a year earlier.

Sales rose to $19.12 billion from $17.81 billion.

(Reporting by Dhanya Skariachan; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)