Mar 11, 2019
A tale of two companies/economies: Lowes Earnings vs Home Depot
by Jeff Small, President of "Arbor Financial Author of new book,
Turning Financial Planning, Right-Side Up."
Lowes Earnings
Lowes was one penny above expectation revenue slightly below
projections. Same store sales and comps where 1.7% v’s expected
2.1%.
2.4 domestically relative to home depot which did 3.7%.
Month of January comp of 5.8% for Lowes positive sign. Lowes is
narrowing the gap but home depot is still in the lead on the
metrics.
Lowes has a 5% deficit in operating margins with same store sales
compared to Home depot. This should change with the new Home Depot
management at Lowes. I pick Lowes to out perform HD over the next
12 months. Even though I believe we are at the top end of the range
in upward stock movement for both.
The market investors are overly concerned about the housing market
and the home improvement sector as a whole. But this fears are not
unfounded with the slowdown that is occurring in the real estate
sector. Contrary to this rising wages and strong employment look
good for both HD and Lowes. However, despite this we are seeing
slowdowns in consumer spending in retail, restaurants and real
estate.
This ties in with the Democrats strategy of rolling back the economic reforms passed by the Trump Team. The problem is that we don't have to money to enact their programs. Free stuff is very expensive!