The TJX Companies, Inc, a off price retailer of apparel and home fashions said its sales rose 6 per cent for the year ago quarter for the third quarter ended November 1, 2014.
Net sales for the third quarter of fiscal 2015 increased 6 per cent year-on-year to $7.4 billion, while comparable store sales increased 2 per cent over last year’s 5 per cent hike.
Net income for the third quarter of fiscal 2015 which includes a tax benefit of $.11 per share reached $595 million and diluted earnings per share were $.85 as against last year’s $.86 per share.
Excluding this benefit, TJX said, adjusted diluted earnings per share surged 13 per cent over last year’s adjusted $.75 per share.
The impact of foreign currency exchange rates to this year’s third quarter earnings per share was neutral versus its expectation of a $.01 per share benefit.
TJX posted consolidated pretax profit margin of 13.0 per cent for the reporting quarter, up 0.4 percentage points over a strong increase in the prior year third quarter.
The gross profit margin for the third quarter of fiscal 2015 was 29.4 per cent, a very marginal hike of just 0.1 percentage points versus strong growth in the year earlier quarter.
SG&A costs as a per cent of sales touched 16.2 per cent in the quarter under review, a 0.4 percentage point improvement coming from items in the third quarter last year and expense favourability.
Total inventories as of November 1, 2014 were down to $4.0 billion, compared with $3.7 billion at the end of the third quarter last year.
Consolidated inventories on a per-store basis, including distribution centres, but excluding inventory in transit and its e-commerce businesses, were up 2 per cent on a reported basis versus a 4 per cent decline last year.
TJX informed that it enters the fourth quarter in an excellent position to capitalize on the plentiful buying opportunities it is seeing in the marketplace.
During the third quarter, the Company repurchased a total of $448 million of TJX stock, retiring 7.5 million shares.
For the first nine months of fiscal 2015, the retailer spent a total of $1.2 billion in repurchases of TJX stock, retiring 21.5 million shares.
TJX continues to expect to repurchase approximately $1.6 to $1.7 billion of stock in fiscal 2015 and may adjust the amount of this spending up or down depending on various factors.
For the fourth quarter of fiscal 2015, TJX updated its diluted earnings per share guidance in the range of $.86 to $.90, which represents a 6-11 per cent increase over last year’s $.81 per share.
CEO Carol Meyrowitz said, “We have many new in-store initiatives that we believe will both surprise and delight our customers.”
“We remain very confident in the short- and long-term growth prospects for our business as we grow TJX to a $40 billion-plus company,” she added. (AR)
