Shares of Costco (COST) fell slightly in after-hours trading after the retailer reported earnings for its second quarter of Fiscal Year 2025. Earnings per share came in at $4.02, which missed analysts’ consensus estimate of $4.09 per share.
On the other hand, sales increased by 9% year-over-year, with revenue hitting $63.72 billion. This beat analysts’ expectations of $63.11 billion and was driven by growth in adjusted comparable sales. When breaking down these numbers into geographical segments, growth was as follows:
- U.S. 8.6%
- Canada 10.5%
- Other International 10.3%
- Total Company 9.1%
- E-commerce 22.2%
What’s interesting is that Costco’s e-commerce segment saw such strong results despite getting less traffic to its website this quarter. In fact, when compared to the same quarter of last year, website traffic actually fell by more than 20%, according to TipRanks’ data. This suggests that Costco is doing a better job of monetizing the people who visit its online store.
Costco Returns $927M to Shareholders
During the past 24 weeks, Costco returned $927 Million to shareholders. Dividends made up $515 million, while buybacks made up the remaining. The firm has regularly repurchased its shares in each of the most recent quarters (as demonstrated in the image below).
Is COST Stock a Buy or Sell?
Unfortunately, Costco did not provide an outlook. However, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on COST stock based on 17 Buys, eight Holds, and zero Sells assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 31% rally in its share price over the past year, the average COST price target of $1,088.75 per share implies 6.05% upside potential. However, it’s worth noting that estimates will likely change following today’s earnings report.
