Federated Department Stores said Wednesday it swung to a profit in the latest quarter, helped by higher gross margins, but it said sales were "disappointing" at its new Macy's stores.
The retailer, which plans to change its corporate name to Macy's so long as its shareholders approve the measure on Friday, reduced its forecast for second-quarter, but reiterated its forecast for the full year.
For the three months ended May 5, net income was $36 million, or 8 cents a diluted share, compared with a loss of $52 million, or 9 cents a share, a year earlier.
Excluding merger integration costs, profit from continuing operations was 16 cents a share, up from 1 cent a year ago.
These results were lower than analysts were expecting. According to Thomson Financial, Federated was expected to earn 19 cents a share.
Sales slipped 0.1% to $5.92 billion from $5.93 billion last year, missing estimates for $5.99 billion.