Home Depot misses on revenue, as high interest rates hurt sales

by | May 14, 2024 | Business

In this articleHDFollow your favorite stocksCREATE FREE ACCOUNTHome Depot on Tuesday posted quarterly revenue below Wall Street’s expectations, as shoppers postponed bigger discretionary projects like bath and kitchen remodels because of higher interest rates and made spring purchases late.Still, the home improvement retailer reaffirmed its full-year guidance, which includes an additional week from the prior year. It said it expects total sales to grow about 1% in fiscal 2024, including those extra days. However, the retailer said it anticipates comparable sales, which take out the impact of store openings and closures, to decline about 1%, excluding that additional week.In an interview with CNBC, Chief Financial Officer Richard McPhail said customers are in a waiting game that began in the second half of last year, as they responded to mortgage rates climbing. He said the company anticipated those trends would continue.”The home improvement customer is extremely healthy from a financial perspective,” he said. “And so it’s not the case of not having the ability to spend. What they tell us is they’re just simply deferring these projects as given higher rates, it just doesn’t seem the right moment to execute.”The logo of U.S. home improvement chain Home Depot is seen in Mexico City, Mexico, on Jan. 15, 2020.Luis Cortes | ReutersHere’s what the company reported for the three-month period that ended April 28 compared with what Wall Street expected, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:Earnings per share: $3.63 vs. $3.60 expectedRevenue: $36.42 billion vs. $36.66 billion expectedNet income for the fiscal first quarter decreased to $3.6 billion, or $3.63 per share, from $3.87 billion, or $3.82 per share, in the year-ago period. Net sales fell 2.3% from $37.26 billion.Comparable sales dropped 2.8% in the fiscal first quarter across the business and declined 3.2% in the U.S.Shares of Home Depot fell nearly 2% in premarket trading.Home Depot is contending with a tougher housing backdrop, which has dampened demand for do-it-yourself projects. About half of Home Depot’s sales come from DIY customers, and the other half come from pros like roofers and landscapers.As interest rates remain high, consumers have been reluctant to move out of their homes and into new ones — the kind of turnover that often inspires home projects. Higher interest rates have also dinged the desire for larger-scale projects that can require financing. For the past several quarters, Home Depot has seen customers buy fewer big-ticket items and take on more modest projects – a trend that persisted in the most recent quarter.In the fiscal first quarter, customers made fewer visits to Home Depot’s stores and website and tended to spend less whe …

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[mwai_chat context=”Let’s have a discussion about this article:nnIn this articleHDFollow your favorite stocksCREATE FREE ACCOUNTHome Depot on Tuesday posted quarterly revenue below Wall Street’s expectations, as shoppers postponed bigger discretionary projects like bath and kitchen remodels because of higher interest rates and made spring purchases late.Still, the home improvement retailer reaffirmed its full-year guidance, which includes an additional week from the prior year. It said it expects total sales to grow about 1% in fiscal 2024, including those extra days. However, the retailer said it anticipates comparable sales, which take out the impact of store openings and closures, to decline about 1%, excluding that additional week.In an interview with CNBC, Chief Financial Officer Richard McPhail said customers are in a waiting game that began in the second half of last year, as they responded to mortgage rates climbing. He said the company anticipated those trends would continue.”The home improvement customer is extremely healthy from a financial perspective,” he said. “And so it’s not the case of not having the ability to spend. What they tell us is they’re just simply deferring these projects as given higher rates, it just doesn’t seem the right moment to execute.”The logo of U.S. home improvement chain Home Depot is seen in Mexico City, Mexico, on Jan. 15, 2020.Luis Cortes | ReutersHere’s what the company reported for the three-month period that ended April 28 compared with what Wall Street expected, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:Earnings per share: $3.63 vs. $3.60 expectedRevenue: $36.42 billion vs. $36.66 billion expectedNet income for the fiscal first quarter decreased to $3.6 billion, or $3.63 per share, from $3.87 billion, or $3.82 per share, in the year-ago period. Net sales fell 2.3% from $37.26 billion.Comparable sales dropped 2.8% in the fiscal first quarter across the business and declined 3.2% in the U.S.Shares of Home Depot fell nearly 2% in premarket trading.Home Depot is contending with a tougher housing backdrop, which has dampened demand for do-it-yourself projects. About half of Home Depot’s sales come from DIY customers, and the other half come from pros like roofers and landscapers.As interest rates remain high, consumers have been reluctant to move out of their homes and into new ones — the kind of turnover that often inspires home projects. Higher interest rates have also dinged the desire for larger-scale projects that can require financing. For the past several quarters, Home Depot has seen customers buy fewer big-ticket items and take on more modest projects – a trend that persisted in the most recent quarter.In the fiscal first quarter, customers made fewer visits to Home Depot’s stores and website and tended to spend less whe …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]
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