Target (TGT) reported earnings on Wed 21 Aug 2019 (b/o)

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** charts after earnings **

Target beats by $0.20, reports revs in-line; guides Q3 EPS in-line; raises FY20 EPS guidance; Q2 comps +3.4% 

Reports Q2 (Jul) earnings of $1.82 per share, excluding non-recurring items, $0.20 better than the S&P Capital IQ Consensus of $1.62; revenues rose 3.6% year/year to $18.42 bln vs the $18.32 bln S&P Capital IQ Consensus.

Second quarter comparable sales grew 3.4%,driven by 2.4% traffic growth. Comparable sales have grown approximately 10% over the last two years - the best performance in more than a decade. Second quarter comparable digital channel sales grew 34%. Same-day fulfillment services (Order Pick Up, Drive Up and Shipt) accounted for nearly 1.5 percentage points of the Company's overall comparable sales growth. 

Second quarter gross margin rate was 30.6%, compared with 30.3% in 2018, reflecting the benefit of merchandising efforts to optimize costs, pricing, promotions and assortment, combined with the benefit of favorable category sales mix.

Co issues in-line guidance for Q3, sees EPS of $1.04-1.24, excluding non-recurring items, vs. $1.17 S&P Capital IQ Consensus.

Co issues raised guidance for FY20, sees EPS of $5.90-6.20 from $5.75-6.05, excluding non-recurring items, vs. $5.94 S&P Capital IQ Consensus.

For both the third quarter and second half of 2019, Target expects comparable sales growth in line with the 3.4% comparable sales growth the company delivered in the second quarter of 2019.