Finance

Canada Goose shares soared 16% on Thursday after reporting fiscal fourth-quarter earnings.
The company also announced it was expecting year-over-year sales growth for fiscal year 2025.
Canada Goose announced earlier this year that it was going to cut 17% of its corporate workforce.

Chris So | Toronto Star | Getty Images

Shares of Canada Goose surged 16% on Thursday after the company reported earnings for the fiscal fourth quarter and announced it was expecting year-over-year sales growth for fiscal year 2025.
Here’s how the company did:

Earnings per share: 5 Canadian cents, which may not compare with estimates of 7 Canadian cents
Revenue: CA$358 million (US$263 million), which may not compare with the CA$315.5 million (US$232 million) expected by LSEG.

Revenue increased 22% from the same period a year ago.
Neil Bowden, Canada Goose’s chief financial officer, said on an earnings call with analysts that store comparisons were “relatively flat,” but year-over-year sales growth for the period was led by locations in Greater China — the region comprising Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan — which saw a 29.7% increase. The broader Asia-Pacific region excluding Greater China was up 29.1%, and North American sales saw an increase of 24.5%.
Net income for the fiscal fourth quarter ended March 31 swung to CA$7.6 million, or 5 Canadian cents per share, from a loss of CA$10 million, or 3 Canadian cents per share, in the year-earlier period.
Bowden said the growth was supported by domestic shopping on the Chinese mainland, as well as mainland tourists driving “strong growth” in Hong Kong and Macao.
Online and in-store sales for the period, he added, were “bolstered by the company’s Lunar New Year marketing campaign and complemented by a longer peak selling period, given the later date of the Lunar New Year compared to last year.”

Moving forward, the finance chief said the company is expecting mid-single-digit percentage revenue growth the next fiscal year, which he expects will be guided by advances in the direct-to-consumer business. He also said he expects comparable store sales to grow “somewhere in the low single digits.”
Bowden said Canada Goose’s business increase in China and Asia Pacific over the past three months is in line with the view of mid-single-digit growth for the luxury business. North America, however, has been under “a little bit more pressure,” he said.
This upbeat performance comes after the company announced back in March that it was going to cut 17% of its corporate workforce. Canada Goose reported the layoffs had generated about CA$20 million (US$14.7 million) in productivity improvements and cost savings for the fiscal fourth quarter.

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The 30-stock benchmark broke above 40,000 for the first time.
Investors anticipate artificial intelligence boosting corporate profits and the Federal Reserve possibly cutting rates later this year.
The Dow first closed above 20,000 in early 2017, on the heels of lower corporate taxes in the U.S. under former President Donald Trump.

Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters

The Dow Jones Industrial Average reached a milestone Thursday that seemed unfathomable a year ago.
The 30-stock benchmark broke above 40,000 for the first time. The move comes as investors cheer the prospects of artificial intelligence boosting corporate profits and the Federal Reserve possibly cutting rates later this year as inflation eases further from its pandemic highs.

It’s been a long and winding road for the Dow to climb to these levels. Here’s a look at the Dow’s trajectory over the past 20,000 points.

The Dow first closed above 20,000 in early 2017, as investors began pricing in lower corporate taxes in the U.S. under former President Donald Trump. Those expectations were met toward the end of that year and also drove the Dow above 25,000 by January 2018.
However, the Dow struggled in 2018 after the excitement around lower taxes faded, with trade tensions between China and the U.S. rising and the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. The Dow finished the year down more than 5%.

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In 2019, the stock market recovered as the Fed pivoted away from raising rates. By early 2020, the Dow was nearing 30,000 — reaching a high of 29,551.42 on Feb. 12, 2020.
Then came the Covid-19 pandemic. The Dow tumbled 38% from its February 2020 intraday peak to a low of 18,213.65 in March 2020.

Over the following months, the benchmark would recover as progress on Covid vaccine development ramped up and the Fed and lawmakers took unprecedented measures to support the economy. By November 2020, the Dow had closed above 30,000 for the first time.
The momentum from the Covid lows carried through to 2021, with the Dow breaking above 35,000. However, the good times wouldn’t last for much longer, as a bear market knocked the Dow all the way down to 28,660.51 before it recovered. Since reaching that low, the Dow has surged 40%.
— CNBC’s Gabriel Cortés contributed reporting. More

Walmart shopping bag is seen in Krakow, Poland on February 9, 2024.
Jakub Porzycki | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Check out the companies making headlines in premarket trading.
Under Armour — The sportswear maker’s Class A shares slumped 11% and its Class C stock fell 9% after it issued lower-than-expected full-year earnings guidance. Under Armour now expects earnings in the range of 18 cents to 21 cents while analysts polled by FactSet had forecast 59 cents.

Canada Goose — The coat maker jumped more than 12% after beating Wall Street estimates for sales and earnings in its fiscal fourth quarter. Canada Goose said one key profit margin metric “will expand by approximately 100 basis points compared to fiscal 2024” this year.
Walmart — The big-box retailer popped 4.7% after reporting adjusted first-quarter earnings of 60 cents per sharer, topping the 52 cents expected from analysts polled by LSEG. Revenue was $161.5 billion, beating the $159.5 billion consensus estimate. Walmart said it made big gains in e-commerce and won over more high-income shoppers.
Chubb — Stock in the insurance company climbed more than 8.1% before Thursday’s opening bell after Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway revealed Chubb is the secret stock the conglomerate has been accumulating. Berkshire bought nearly 26 million shares for about $6.7 billion making it the second-largest holder in Chubb, according to a regulatory filing.
Cisco Systems – The networking equipment stock gained 3% after posting stronger-than-expected fiscal third-quarter results. Cisco Systems also hiked its 2024 revenue guidance, saying it now expects revenue of $53.7 billion at the midpoint of a range.
Meme stocks — Shares of AMC and GameStop extended losses following the revival of the meme stock movement on Monday and Tuesday. Stock in movie theater chain AMC fell nearly 11% on Thursday, while GameStop pulled back roughly 14%. For the week, however, shares of AMC and GameStop have soared more than 80% and 140%, respectively.

Deere & Company — The agricultural equipment maker slipped nearly 6% after slashing its full-year outlook. Deere now forecasts net income of about $7 billion in 2024, compared to a previous estimate that called for $7.75 billion.
Baidu — Shares of the Chinese tech company were up less than 1% after releasing first-quarter results. Baidu reported CNY 31.51 billion ($4.7 billion) of revenue, topping the CNY 31.34 billion expected by analysts, according to StreetAccount.
GoodRX — The healthcare stock climbed about 6% following an upgrade to outperform from Raymond James early Thursday. Analyst John Ransom noted that he views “the growth story here favorably with potential upside to numbers” and that the company’s full-year guidance is relatively conservative.
Coupang — The Seattle-based e-commerce company rose 3.1%. UBS upgraded shares to buy from neutral, citing its “expanding portfolio and strong logistics network.”
Dell — Shares ticked up 2% after Evercore ISI raised its price target thanks to what the firm said is a broadening artificial intelligence opportunity that could include Tesla as a customer.
Meta Platforms — Shares fell 0.5% after the European Union opened a probe into Meta, centering around child safety concerns on social media platforms Facebook and Instagram.
— CNBC’s Michelle Fox, Hakyung Kim, Sarah Min, Samantha Subin and Jesse Pound contributed reporting More

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