Home Depot Posted First-Quarter Earnings That Beat Expectations

Home Depot ( HD ) reported disappointing first-quarter earnings and revenue that missed Wall Street's expectations. The company is experiencing customers deferring major home projects due to high interest rates, which has led to a focus on building its business with professionals, including through its acquisition of SRS Distribution. The company expects total sales to grow about 1% in fiscal 2024, including an additional week from the prior year. However, it anticipates comparable sales, which take out the impact of store openings and closures, to decline about 1%, excluding that additional week.

Home Depot's 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. "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."

Home Depot's sales for the three months 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 expected. Revenue: $36.42 billion vs. $36.66 billion expected. Net 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.

Home Depot ( HD ) has seen sales moderate after more than two years of explosive demand during the COVID-19 pandemic. The company posted its worst revenue miss in nearly two decades and cut its forecast in the year-ago first quarter. Home Depot's sales totaled $152.7 billion in the fiscal year that ended in late January, a drop of 3% year over year.

Inflation may also be playing a role in that pullback, as consumers spend more money on essentials and have to make trade-offs when spending discretionary income. However, McPhail said Home Depot is not seeing customers trade down to cheaper items, like less expensive power tools or appliances. He pinned the company's softer sales in large part on consumers' "deferral mindset" and a housing market that has slowed dramatically.

To overcome slower sales, Home Depot ( HD ) has revved up its strategy to attract pros, since they tend to buy larger quantities and offer a steadier source of sales. In March, Home Depot announced that it would acquire SRS Distribution, a Texas-based specialty distributor of roofing, landscaping, and pool supplies, for $18.25 billion in the largest acquisition in the company's history.

Along with wooing pros, Home Depot ( HD ) is poised to drive growth by opening about a dozen new stores this fiscal year and adding features to improve its online and in-store experience. Shares of Home Depot closed Monday at $340.96. So far this year, Home Depot's shares have fallen about 2% compared with the roughly 9% gains of the S&P 500.