Indianapolis-based hhgregg (HGGGQ) shares are under pressure in early Thursday trading, following release of the company's fiscal Q1 2014 earnings results. This is despite numbers that, on the surface at least, do not look bad at all.
Reporting a net loss of $0.04 per share on revenues of $524.9 million in revenues, hhgregg beat analyst estimates on both counts. Yahoo! Finance reports that analysts had been worrying about a bigger loss of $0.15 per share, and expecting lower revenue of just $523.8 million.
Sales increased 7.2% in the quarter, versus fiscal Q1 2013, a significant slowdown from the 13.5% rate of sales growth seen a year ago. However, in marked contrast with last year's performance, hhgregg showed a small increase in sales from existing stores (known as "comparable store sales"), versus the decline seen in such established stores last year. In Q1 2013, literally all of the company's growth in sales came as a result of opening new stores.
As of the end of the fiscal first quarter, hhgregg had 228 stores up and running, an increase of 18 from this time, last year.
