Chico's FAS Logs Profit For Q1; Ups Annual Outlook

(RTTNews) - Women's clothing and accessories retailer Chico's FAS, Inc. (CHS) on Tuesday reported profit in the first quarter compared with loss a year ago, helped by comparable-sales growth. The company also raised its full-year outlook.

Net income was $34.93 million or $0.28 per share in the first quarter compared with net loss of $8.93 million or $0.08 per share in the comparable quarter last year.

Quarterly sales were $540.92 million, up from $387.96 million in last year's first quarter, driven by comparable-sales increase of more than 40%.

Looking forward to the second quarter, the company expects net sales to be in the range of $535 million to $550 million and earnings per share of $0.21-$0.26 range. In the last year's second quarter the company had sales of $472.06 million and earnings of $0.21 per share.

For the full-year, Chico's has raised its sales outlook to $2.13 billion-$2.16 billion range from $2.085 billion-$2.115 billion provided earlier. EPS for the year is expected between $0.64 and $0.74, up from the prior guidance of $0.40-$0.50.

Chico's FAS shares are up more than 6% in pre-market. It closed at $4.87, up 0.83% on Monday.