Shares of shoe retailer Foot Locker surged Friday after the company reported earnings well ahead of Wall Street expectations.
The stock rallied more than 15 percent in premarket trading after the New York-based company reported adjusted earnings per share at $1.45 for the first quarter, above consensus estimates of $1.25 from FactSet.
The shoe store posted revenue of $2.03 billion, which also beat forecasts.
“The flow of premium product continues to improve, with increasing breadth and depth in the most sought-after styles from our key vendors,” CEO Richard Johnson said in a statement. “This led to first quarter results which were above our expectations. With the strength of our strategic vendor partnerships and our central position in youth culture, we continue to believe that we are poised to inflect to positive comparable-store sales growth.”
Foot Locker has been in hot water in recent months as Wall Street grows increasingly concerned with retailers. Fears that e-commerce giant Amazon may seek to expand into apparel have made it a tough year for Foot Locker shares, now down more than 22 percent over the past 12 months.
Last June, popular shoemaker Nike confirmed plans to sell a limited product assortment on Amazon’s U.S. website.
According to a 2017 survey by UBS, 13 percent of respondents indicated that they prefer to purchase Nike products on Amazon compared with the 9 percent who said they prefer to purchase the same products at Foot Locker.
Foot Locker shares are jumping 15% after a blowout earnings report