Brooke DiPalma · Senior Reporter
Actualizado 3 min read
Costco (COST) stock fell more than 2% early Friday after its fourth quarter results showed US same-store sales came in slightly below forecasts as the company navigated a choppy consumer landscape, tariff-related pressure, and competition from peers like Walmart’s (WMT) Sam’s Club.
Costco’s headline profits and revenue beat Wall Street expectations, with revenue at the wholesale giant clocking in at $86.16 billion compared to expectations of $86.03 billion, with adjusted earnings per share coming in at $5.87, higher than the forecast $5.82, per Bloomberg consensus estimates.
Same-store sales grew 6.4%, slightly higher than the 6.2% growth expected. US same-store sales were up 6%, slightly lower than the 6.1% predicted, while sales in Canada grew the most, up 8.3%, higher than the 6.8% jump analysts predicted. Sales in other international markets were up 7.2%, in line with the 7.2% estimated. Walmart’s Sam’s Club posted same-store sales growth of 5.9% in its latest results.
Annual revenue for Costco’s fiscal 2025 tallied $275.24 billion, with adjusted earnings per share of $18.21, higher than the $18.10 the Street estimated, according to Bloomberg data. Same-store sales beat too, at 7.6% growth, compared to the 7.5% anticipated.
In times of economic uncertainty, “everyday value items” are “extremely important,” CFO Gary Millerchip said on an earnings call. Newness and value resonated with customers, Millerchip said, but they “remain very choiceful in their spending on discretionary items.”
“There are no better examples of this than our hot dog combo, rotisserie chicken, and [private label Kirkland Signature] bath tissue,” he said.
In fiscal year 2025, Millerchip boasted that the company sold over 245 million hot dog combos, over 157 million rotisserie chickens, and enough bath tissue “to reach the moon and back over 200 times.”
Year to date, Costco stock has been a laggard. With Friday’s decline, the stock is flat for the year against the S&P 500’s (^GSPC) 13% gain.
Oppenheimer analyst Rupesh Parikh noted that during the most recent quarter, Amazon rolled out its same-day delivery initiative, and since then, Costco’s stock — alongside BJ’s (BJ), Dollar General (DG), Dollar Tree (DLTR), and Kroger (KR) — has underperformed. Costco grew membership fee income by 14% from a year ago to $1.72 billion and the number of cardholders increased 6.1%.
“We’re very aware of new competition into this space, and we continue to watch that very closely,” CEO Ron Vachris said on the call.
Costco partnered with Uber Eats and Instacart for same-day delivery in recent years, which he said is growing at a “good rate” and continues to be a “very good business.” Moving forward, online sales will be included in its e-commerce same-store sales growth, which grew 15% this past quarter.
Millerchip told investors this quarter that the company worked closely with suppliers to mitigate tariff impact, including swapping the countries in which it produces, consolidating its buying efforts globally to lower the cost of goods, and changing item assortment “where appropriate.”
For example, the company increased domestically sourced goods and leaned into “health and beauty, live goods, tires, and mattresses.”
Heading into the holiday season, he said “product mix will look a little different from years past,” adding that its buyers “really had to evaluate all the discretionary items,” like toys and decorations, while making decisions on “necessities” like Christmas trees.
Without overinvestment there, the company said it was able to lean into higher-ticket goods in “new categories” like in-home saunas and furniture that weren’t available before “due to space limitations.”
Brooke DiPalma is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on X at @BrookeDiPalma or email her at bdipalma@yahoofinance.com.
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