Home Depot indicated it has no plans for broad price increases in the wake of recent tariff actions after posting first-quarter earnings that missed and sales that beat Wall Street expectations.
Net earnings for the first quarter were $3.43 billion, or $3.45 per diluted share, compared with $3.6 billion, or $3.63 per diluted share, in the year-earlier quarter.
Adjusted for one-time events diluted earnings per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2025 were $3.56 versus $3.67 in the year-prior period, the company stated.
A Zacks analyst consensus estimate called for earning per adjusted dilutes share of $3.59 and revenues of $39.4 billion.
Comparable sales for the quarter decreased 0.3% even as comparable sales in the U.S. increased 0.2% year over year. Sales were $39.86 billion versus $36.42 billion in the year-before period.
Operating income was $5.13 billion versus $5.08 billion in the year-previous quarter while adjusted operating income $5.27 billion versus $5.13 billion.
The company noted that, among product categories offered by Home Depot, appliances, plumbing, indoor garden, electrical, outdoor garden and building materials saw positive comps.
As it looks to deal with new tariffs, Billy Bastek, Home Depot executive vice president of merchandising, said in a conference call the company would use internal levers, including boosting productivity, to avoid broadly increasing prices to its customers. Bastek added Home Depot would manage its product portfolio to help hold the line on prices, and it could drop items if tariff-inflated prices would be too high to make sense in the company’s product assortment.
“We don’t see broad-based price increases for our customers at all going forward,” Bastek said. “It’s a great opportunity for us to take share, and it’s a great opportunity for our suppliers to take share as well.”
In the conference call, Ted Decker, Home Depot chair, president and CEO, said first-quarter results were just about what the company anticipated despite unfavorable weather in February and unplanned pressure from foreign exchange rates.
Decker pointed out Home Depot sources more than half of its product purchases in the United States. The company has worked with its vendors for several years to diversify Home Depot’s global supply chain, he said, and the majority of suppliers have developed diversified sourcing strategies across multiple countries including the U.S. As such, Home Depot now has enhanced sourcing flexibility, Decker noted. As it continues retooling its supply chain, Home Depot reported its expects that 12 months from now, no single country outside of the United States will produce more than 10% of product sourced.
In announcing Home Depot’s financial result, Decker said. “Our first quarter results were in line with our expectations as we saw continued customer engagement across smaller projects and in our spring events,. We feel great about our store readiness and product assortment as spring continues to break across the country.”
