Jos. A. Bank Earnings Send Shorts Scrambling (JOSB)

Retail

Published: June 4, 2008 12:46 pm

JoS. A. Bank Clothiers, Inc. (NASDAQ: JOSB) has just announced its quarterly earnings report for its Q1-2008. Earnings rose by 18% to $0.53 EPS, compared to $0.45 EPS for Q1-2007 and compares to First Call estimates of $0.46 EPS. Net income for Q1-2008 was $9.8 million, up from $8.4 million in Q1-2007. Its total net sales increased 12.3% to $145.4 million from $129.5 million; comparable store sales increased 6.4% and direct marketing sales increased 0.2%. First Call had revenues at $142.3 million.

As many of you know, this is one of the more heavily shorted retail apparel stocks out there. As of May 15, it had 13.558 million shares listed in the short interest. Shares are now up 8% at $29.50 after the news. That was 14.57 days to cover, but was lower than some other recent readings.

That is still plenty of shares to send short sellers scrambling. As far as garnering any guidance, it has a conference call late tomorrow morning.

Jon C. Ogg
June 4, 2008

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