April same-store sales increases were below expectations in the sense that the 9th floor is below the 10th floor:
The nation's discounters, whose customers have been particularly hurt by high gas prices and job weakness, had another lackluster month. Wal-Mart had a 0.9 percent gain in same-store sales, slightly below the 1 percent consensus prediction of Wall Street analysts polled by Thomson Financial.Also note that the previous figures IGNORE Wal-Mart's expansion. These don't:Wal-Mart did get a boost from Sam's Club, which posted a 4.9 percent gain for the month. That compared with the company's flagship discount stores, which had only a 0.1 percent increase.
Wal-Mart said quarterly net income grew to $2.5 billion, or 58 cents per share, in the three months ended April 30 from $2.2 billion, or 50 cents per share, a year earlier. The company said first-quarter earnings were boosted by $145 million, or 3 cents per share, from tax and legal resolutions. Excluding the items, earnings per share totaled 55 cents per share, a penny below Wall Street expectations.Sales rose 10 percent to $70.9 billion from $64.76 billion a year ago, while total revenue including sales and other income grew to $71.7 billion from $65.4 billion a year ago.Here's the full press release.
Let's include H. Lee Scott's comments, for the fun of it:
Chief executive officer Lee Scott said: "We achieved record results in the quarter. Yet with higher gasoline prices and a cooler and wetter spring than normal, we missed our plan. We are making the necessary adjustments and I anticipate better results in the second half of the year."In other words, we can't predict the weather and we don't control oil markets, so bugger off.In a recorded message, he told journalists: "Our results were not up to Wal-Mart standards," adding "The biggest unknown is the impact of gasoline prices on our customer base. If oil prices stay at the current level or hopefully go lower, we would see better sales momentum."
Posted by Kevin on May, 13 2005 at 07:01 AM
