After Wednesday’s closing bell, Whole Foods Market Inc. (NASDAQ:$WFM) will report its third quarter earnings. This will mark the company’s first earnings report since Amazon (NASDAQ:$AMZN) announced it was buying the natural grocer for $42 a share.
Here are 5 things you need to know before Whole Foods releases their Q3 report:
- Earnings Forecast: In terms of net income, the forecast is 33 cents a share for the fiscal quarter ending in June, according to analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters. This is significant news as it is down 11% from the 37 cents earned in 2016. However, revenue is expected to stay flat at $3.7 billion for the quarter.
- Mute on the Merger: Whole Foods will be playing hooky on an investor call because of Amazon’s pending $13.8 billion deal to purchase the Texas-based company. In the report, investors can expect updates on Whole Food’s financials.
- Pricing: Whole Foods is sparing millions of dollars in revenue to cut store prices and advertise its deals to shoppers in 2017. In the grocer’s third quarter earnings report, Wall Street will be looking for positive news in regards to customer traffic and how much Whole Foods is spending on the efforts.
- Sales Shift: The troubled natural grocer has endured 21 months of negative same-store sales, which is a main retailer metric. In May, Whole Foods promised to reverse the declines by the end of its current fiscal year, however investors should still expect WFM to report negative sales growth again this quarter. In the last quarter ending in March, Whole Foods reported same-store sales of -2.8%.
- Updates on Operations: Last quarter, Whole Foods appointed a new CFO, who promised a store-wide rollout of a loyalty program in 2017. Additionally, he vowed to transform how it stocks its shelves by 2018. Despite the pending merger, Whole Foods could provide updates on these operations in the third quarter earnings report.
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