Advance Shares Skyrocket After 42 Percent Loss

Nov. 22, 2017
Initiatives that included material cost improvements, third-party fee reductions, and improvements in utility, maintenance and repair costs contributed to the increase.

Nov. 22, 2107—Shares of Advance Auto Parts skyrocketed 25 percent after quarterly profit came in well above expectations and the company kept its full-year guidance intact, offsetting a slight sales miss, according to Market Watch.

Shares of Advance Auto Parts have lost 42 percent this year.

Analysts at Oppenheimer said they left Advance Auto Part’s post-earnings conference call “still fretting” about soft sales, “but incrementally encouraged by a more upbeat tone of management toward the company’s repositioning efforts and the health of the broader environment.”

Initiatives that included material cost improvements, third-party fee reductions, and improvements in utility, maintenance and repair costs contributed to the margin beat.

The stock was on track for its highest close since Oct. 3, and its intraday high of $102.89 was its highest since Aug. 14.

“After stunningly poor results in both (first quarter and second quarter), we believe the company has finally started to show some progress against their long-term profit plans,” analysts at RBC Capital said in a note Tuesday.

Turnarounds are never linear and Advance Auto Parts would be no exception, they said, but if the company can deliver on its margin goals “we think it will be the biggest margin expansion story in Hardlines/Broadlines retail—and the stock will likely reward investors if they can execute,” they said, using a term that encompasses full-line and specialty retail stores.

The run for Advance Auto Parts also lifted shares of competitors O’Reilly Automotive and AutoZone.

Advance Auto Parts earlier Tuesday reported adjusted third-quarter earnings of $1.43 a share on sales of $2.18 billion. Analysts polled by FactSet had expected adjusted earnings of $1.21 a share on sales of $2.21 billion.

Wall Street also zeroed in on a smaller-than-expected decline in margins rather than the sales miss and the overall soft sales trends for the chain.

Margin performance was “far better than modeled, as gross profit dollars exceeded our estimate, and expense dollars tracked well below,” analysts at Goldman Sachs said in a note Tuesday. The guidance implies 2017 per-share earnings in the $4.50-$5.50 range, encompassing Goldman’s and Wall Street’s around $5 to $5.15 a share, they said.

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