Home Depot's second-quarter sales top estimates, shares rise early

By Nandita Bose

(Reuters) - Home Depot Inc on Tuesday reported second-quarter sales that beat Wall Street estimates and revised its earnings forecast for the year, boosted by a rebound in demand for seasonal merchandise and as more shoppers made purchases.

Shares of the No. 1 U.S. home improvement chain, up 25 percent in the past 12 months, rose nearly 1 percent to $196 in premarket trading.

"Not only did our seasonal business rebound from the first quarter, but our overall results exceeded our expectations," Craig Menear, chairman and chief executive officer, said in a statement.

The performance comes at a time when sales of new U.S. single-family homes fell to an eight-month low in June and data for the prior month was revised sharply lower, the latest indications that the housing market was slowing down.

The company's sales rebounded from the first quarter when cooler-than-usual weather in some parts of the United States hurt demand for spring-season products.

The retailer raised its full-year earnings forecast to $9.42 per share from $9.31. It also now expects comparable sales growth of about 5.3 percent from 5 percent earlier.

Home Depot said customer transactions rose 3.1 percent in the second quarter ended July 29.

Sales at Home Depot stores open for more than a year climbed 8 percent, beating the average analyst estimate of a 6.65 percent rise, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Net earnings increased to $3.5 billion, or $3.05 per share, in the quarter, from $2.7 billion, or $2.25, a year earlier. Analysts expected $2.84 per share.

Net sales rose 8.4 percent to $30.5 billion, beating expectations of $30.03 billion.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose in New York; Editing by Kirsten Donovan, Jane Merriman and Jeffrey Benkoe)