Fitness financials: Nike’s Q1 net income up 9 percent, plus Finish Line

Nike’s Q1 net income up 9 percent

Nike (NYSE: NKE) reported a solid first quarter and strong orders for the upcoming season.

It earned $599 million, or $1.14 per share for the quarter that ended Aug. 31, versus 9 percent from the $513 million, or $1.04 per share, earned last year.

Revenue rose 8 percent to $5.18 billion, with gains in all of its categories, affiliates and nearly every market.

Nike said orders from retailers for the coming season rose 10 percent — or 13 percent, excluding the impacts of currency fluctuations — its biggest increase in over a decade.

Nike executives said strong demand, tight inventory controls and improved margins outweighed the impact of currency fluctuations and increases in freight and other costs during the quarter.

Revenue was up 8 percent in North America, Nike’s largest market; 11 percent in China, its second-largest market; and 30 percent in other emerging markets, taken together. The only notable decline was in Japan with a 12 percent revenue drop.

The results move the company closer to its long-term goal, announced this spring, of increasing its revenue to $27 billion by 2015, up from $19 billion in its most recent fiscal year.

Finish Line Q2 profit jumps

The Finish Line (Nasdaq: FINL) said its second-quarter profit rose as it rebounded from a messy quarter a year earlier, when it exited its streetwear stores business.

The company said it earned $16.8 million, or $0.31 per share, during the quarter that ended Aug. 28, after losing $874,000, or $0.02 per share, during the same period of 2009. The loss a year earlier mostly resulted from exiting the Man Alive streetwear business in July 2009.

Revenue rose slightly to $301.1 million, from $298.7 million a year earlier. Same-store sales rose 2 percent, after declining 9.9 percent a year earlier.

The company said it ended the quarter with no interest-bearing debt and $253.7 million in cash and equivalents, up from $142.9 million a year earlier.

–Compiled by Wendy Geister

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