TJX Cos. Stock Rises After Earnings Beat, Stock Repurchase Announcement

TJX Cos. shares are up 0.6% in premarket trading after the company announced fourth quarter earnings that beat estimates. The off-price retailer had net income of $666.5 million, or 99 cents per share, up from $648.2 million, or 93 cents per share, for the same period last year. The FactSet consensus was 94 cents. Sales for the quarter totaled $9 billion, up from $8.3 billion last year and beating the FactSet estimate of $8.7 billion. Same-store sales rose across all of the company's brands, including T.J. Maxx (up 6%), HomeGoods (up 7%) and TJX Cananda (up 14%). The company increased its quarterly dividend by 24% to 26 cents per share. The company also said it would repurchase between $1.5 billion and $2 billion in stock during the fiscal year ending Jan. 28, 2017. TJX sees first quarter 2017 earnings per share between 68 cents and 70 cents, below the FactSet consensus of 74 cents owing to a 2% negative foreign exchange impact and a wage initiative that will have a negative impact of 3%. Company shares are up 8.2% for the past 12 months while the S&P 500 is down 9.2% for the same period.