Signet Jewelers Shares Spike After Earnings Beat, E-commerce Acquisition

Signet Jewelers Ltd shares jumped 15.7% in Thursday premarket trading after the company reported earnings and sales that beat expectations and announced a digital acquisition. Signet brands include Piercing Pagoda, Sterling Jewelers and Zale Jewelry. The company reported second-quarter net income of $85.2 million, or $1.33 per share, up from $81.9 million, or $1.06 per share, for the same period last year. The FactSet consensus was $1.04. Revenue totaled $1.40 billion, up from $1.37 billion last year and ahead of the $1.33 billion FactSet consensus. Same-store sales rose 1.4% for the quarter, which the company attributed to e-commerce platform improvements, Mother's Day timing and marketing and bridal promotions. Signet also announced that it will acquire R2Net, owner of online jeweler JamesAllen.com, to further enhance its digital capabilities. E-commerce sales rose 18.1% to $82.2 million in the second quarter. Signet reiterated its fiscal 2018 guidance for a same-store sales decline by a low-to-mid-single digit percentage and EPS of $7.00 to $7.40. The FactSet consensus is for a same-store sales decrease of 4.8% and EPS of $6.69. Signet shares are down 45% for the year so far while the S&P 500 index is up 9.2% for the period.

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