The April retail sales numbers have been flowing in all morning and so far, no so good. The first three months of 2010 saw the majority of retailers beat expectations on a regular basis; April has been a different story with approximately 7 out of 10 retailers coming in short of expectations.
The few names that have been able to beat their numbers have one thing in common – higher end. So while the overall numbers are not good, the fact the high-end retailers are the leaders could be construed as a positive signal. The names beating and clearly situated for better sales in the future include Nordstrom, Macy’s, and Saks.
Below are a few of the highlight and lowlights:
- Urban Outfitters (NASDAQ: URBN) sales up 25% in the first quarter
- Buckle (NYSE: BKE) sales down 5.7% in April, well below the consensus estimate of +1.4%
- Limited Brands (NYSE: LTD) sales up 4% in April basically in-line with +4.1% estimate
- Target (NYSE: TGT) sales down 5.9% versus estimate of -2.3%
- American Eagle (NYSE: AEO) sales down 6% worse than 3.7% estimate
- Dillards (NYSE: DDS) sales down 5%
- Abercrombie & Fitch (NYSE: ANF) sales down 7%, worse than the -2.4% expectation
- Macy’s (NYSE: M) sales up 1.1% beats the estimate of -0.2%
- Saks (NYSE: SKS) sales up 3.2% but still below estimate of +4.3%
- Nordstrom (NYSE: JWN) sales up 7.5% better than +6% expectations
- Ross Stores (NASDAQ: ROST) sales up 3%, but lower than the +6.5% expected
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