Macy’s easily beats forecasts, lifts full-year expectations

Macy’s shares have soared after the company released its latest quarterly results, which surpassed expectations, as the company experienced double-digit growth in its digital business while same-store sales blew past expectations.

The better-than-expected results prompted the retailer to hike its full-year 2018 forecast.

Macy’s reported a first-quarter profit of $0.48 per share (adjusted), topping the estimate for $0.37 and revenue of $5.54 billion, also beating the estimate for $5.36 billion.

In the year-ago period, Macy’s reported an adjusted profit of $0.24 a share on revenue of $5.34 billion.

Macy’s shares were down 1.1% premarket just before the results were released, but surged after the better-than-expected quarterly results were reported.

Ticker	Security	Last	Change	Change %
M	MACY'S INC.	16.93	+0.69	+4.25%

Macy’s same-store sales on an owned basis grew 3.9%, and by 4.2% on an owned-plus-licensed basis, well above the FactSet consensus for a same-store sales increase of 0.7%.

Macy's announced that it will end its joint venture with China’s Fung Retailing Ltd., but will remain on Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.'s (BABA) Tmall platform and social media channels.

The company said in a call discussing its quarterly results that most of the benefits of its strategic initiatives will be seen in the second half of the year.

Macy's increased its fiscal 2018 earnings per share expectations by 20 cents to $3.75 to $3.95, excluding certain charges. Sales are expected to range from a 1% decline to a 0.5% increase from $24.8 billion last year compared to the prior call for a decline of 0.5% to 2%.

Full-year same-store sales on an owned-plus-licensed are expected to be up 1% to 2%.