Burlington Stores readily beat Wall Street first-quarter earnings estimates while squeezing past revenue expectations.
Net income for the quarter was $78.5 million, or $1.22 per diluted share, versus $32.7 million, or 50 cents per diluted share, in the period a year past. With approximately $4 million of expenses, net of tax, associated with the acquisition of Bed Bath & Beyond leases excluded, adjusted net income was $91 million, or $1.42 per diluted share, versus $55 million, or 84 cents per diluted share. for the fiscal 2023 period, according to Burlington.
An analyst consensus estimate published by Yahoo Finance set earnings per adjusted diluted share at $1.04 and revenues at $2.34 billion.
Comparable sales in the quarter gained 2% year over year, the company noted. Net revenue was $2.36 billion versus $2.14 billion in the year-earlier period.
Michael O’Sullivan, Burlington CEO, “We are very pleased with how our sales trends developed in the first quarter. The quarter got off to a slow start in February, likely due to disruptive weather and delayed tax refunds, but then our sales trend picked up. Comparable store sales increased 4% during the months of March and April combined. This resulted in a 2% comparable store sales increase for the quarter which was at the high end of our guidance range. We were especially pleased with our margin improvement and earnings growth during the first quarter. Our adjusted EBIT margin and adjusted EPS increased 170 basis points and 68%, respectively. While 40 basis points of that adjusted EBIT margin improvement, or 10 cents in adjusted EPS, was driven by expense timing, we nevertheless achieved substantial ahead-of-guidance margin improvement and earnings growth. This out-performance was driven by a significant increase in gross margin as well as strong leverage in supply chain expenses.”
As Burlington looks ahead through 2024, O’Sullivan said the company’s management remains “confident in the outlook for our business. Based on our first-quarter performance, we are increasing our margin and earnings guidance for the year. Nevertheless, there continues to be a lot of uncertainty in the external environment. It makes sense to be cautious, so we are maintaining our comparable stores sales guidance of 0% to 2% growth. We are ready to chase if the underlying sales trend is stronger.”
