Costco Wholesale Corporation · COST · FY2024 Q4 · Calendar Q3 2024

Costco: Membership and e-commerce growth offset modest sales growth

Costco's current analysis supports a resilient operating narrative: membership growth, e-commerce, warehouse expansion, and Kirkland Signature initiatives continue to provide demand and traffic support. The counterpoint is that modest sales growth and unresolved SG&A, fee, freight, and inflation questions leave the durability of that growth to be tested.

Reported After market closeNASDAQConsumer Defensive $444.60B market cap
100quality score

Earnings scorecard

Reported versus consensus
Reported EPS $5.15 Consensus $5.08
EPS surprise +1.4% Reported versus consensus
Reported revenue $79.70B Consensus $79.91B
Revenue surprise -0.3% Reported versus consensus

Market reaction

event-close to next-session close
Stock move -1.8% Event window
SPY move -0.1% Same window
Abnormal move -1.6% Stock minus SPY
Volume 1.8× Versus trailing sessions
Subsequent drift +0.6% Up to 20 sessions
COSTSPY benchmark

Ask FN2 about COST FY2024 Q4

Transcript, numbers and history already loaded

Free account. Your question opens in FN2 with this report's transcript and numbers attached.

Transcript intelligence

What changed

Compared with the prior-quarter analysis, Costco's plan now emphasizes a larger FY2025 warehouse rollout, a completed or expanding card-scanner deployment, additional fulfillment options, and continued wage and technology investment. The current analysis also identifies a membership-fee increase as a retention and spending question, whereas the prior analysis said no immediate increase was planned.

Guidance delta

No guidance sentiment was provided in the current transcript analysis; management outlined 26 net new warehouses for FY2025.

Key takeaways

  • Membership growth, warehouse expansion, and e-commerce remained central growth drivers.
  • Management highlighted 26 net new warehouses for FY2025, with 12 outside the United States.
  • Technology investments include card scanners, app inventory checks, and buy-online-pickup testing.
  • Kirkland Signature innovation and price reductions were presented as member-value initiatives.
  • Analyst concerns center on SG&A leverage, fee-increase effects, freight risks, and inflation.

Management priorities

  • Open 26 net new warehouses in FY2025, including 12 outside the United States.
  • Complete the U.S. membership card-scanner rollout and refine checkout processes.
  • Expand e-commerce fulfillment and buy-online-pickup capabilities.
  • Develop Kirkland Signature products and retail media and other alternative revenue streams.

Follow COST with an agent that reads every filing, transcript, and price print. Free to start.

Try FN2 free

Earnings History

Estimate Beat Miss Match
COST EPS earnings history estimate and actual scatter chart 8 reported fiscal quarters and 2 future estimate-only quarters. Q2 '24 estimate $3.62 Q2 '24 actual $3.92, beat Q3 '24 estimate $3.70 Q3 '24 actual $3.78, beat Q4 '24 estimate $5.08 Q4 '24 actual $5.15, beat Q4 '25 estimate $5.80 Q4 '25 actual $5.87, beat Q1 '26 estimate $4.27 Q1 '26 actual $4.34, beat Q2 '26 estimate $4.55 Q2 '26 actual $4.58, beat Q3 '26 estimate $5.00 Q3 '26 actual $4.93, miss Q4 '26 estimate $6.54 Q4 '26 actual $6.75, beat Q1 '27 estimate $4.93 Q2 '27 estimate $5.13

Analyst Consensus ?

ConsensusBuy59 ratings
Bullish3966.1%
Neutral1932.2%
Bearish11.7%

Analyst 52W Price Targets

$1,003.32Current
$491Low
$925.21Average
$1,275High

Latest persisted target per named analyst; persisted current price from FN2's market snapshot as of Oct 24, 2026. Not an FN2 forecast.

Firm-level rating actions

FMP grade actions identify the grading firm, not a named analyst.

FirmRatingPrior ratingActionDate
Tigress Financial Buy BuyMaintainOct 15, 2026
RBC Capital Sector Perform Sector PerformMaintainOct 9, 2026
Deutsche Bank Buy BuyMaintainSep 28, 2026
Argus Research Buy BuyMaintainSep 28, 2026
Wells Fargo Equal Weight Equal WeightMaintainSep 25, 2026
Show 54 more rating actions

Named analyst price targets

Upside is calculated against the persisted current price $1,003.32. FMP does not supply a rating on these named-analyst rows.

FirmAnalyst52W targetPrice when postedUpsideDate
Tigress FinancialJoseph Feldman$1,250$978.01 +24.6%Oct 15, 2026
Deutsche BankKrisztina Katai$1,079$929.26 +7.5%Sep 28, 2026
Truist FinancialAnalyst unavailable$955$919.13 -4.8%Sep 25, 2026
D.A. DavidsonAnalyst unavailable$1,040$919.5 +3.7%Sep 25, 2026
Robert W. BairdAnalyst unavailable$1,175$896.48 +17.1%Sep 25, 2026
See 126 more

Track every rating change on COST the moment it posts. Free to start.

Start free

Company context

Snapshot as of publication

Costco Wholesale Corporation, alongside its group entities, operates membership-based retail warehouses across a broad international scope, spanning the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Spain, France, Iceland, China, and Taiwan. These outlets provide customers with an extensive array of both well-known branded and proprietary private-label products. Their vast inventory includes household staples, shelf-stable groceries, confectionery, chilled and frozen items, alcoholic beverages, tobacco, and deli selections. Furthermore, the stores stock major appliances, consumer electronics, health and beauty aids, hardware, garden and patio furniture, sporting goods, vehicle tires, toys, seasonal merchandise, office supplies, automotive maintenance products, postage services, event tickets, apparel, small kitchen appliances, home furnishings, domestic textiles, kitchenware, custom-order kiosks, and fine jewelry.…

Historical context

All COST earnings

Consumer Defensive peers this season

Latest reports in the same sector
CompanyQuarterEPS surpriseMarket moveHeadline
PG The Procter & Gamble Company FY2027 Q1 · Calendar Q4 2026 +6.4% +5.6% P&G: Volume Growth Supports FY2027 Guidance Despite Cost Headwinds

Latest beats and misses

Who reports next

Get the COST recap when the next report posts

One email per quarter with the scorecard, the market reaction and what changed on the call. No account needed.

Sources

  1. Earnings call transcript and parsed analysis · 2026-05-11T10:29:34.698584+00:00
  2. FN2 earnings calendar · 2024-10-17T05:10:49.140638+00:00
  3. Polygon adjusted daily market bars · 2026-10-24T17:50:42.083755+00:00
  4. Financial Modeling Prep analyst price-target consensus and quote snapshot · 2026-10-24T17:50:42.080736+00:00

Methodology

Reported and consensus figures come from FN2's earnings event records. Market reaction and volume are calculated from daily adjusted bars around the event; abnormal move subtracts the SPY move over the same window.

Analyst target low, average, and high values are derived at request time from each named analyst's latest persisted FMP target. The current-price marker comes from FN2's persisted market snapshot. They are sell-side estimates, not an FN2 valuation or recommendation.

Transcript intelligence is a structured synthesis of the current and prior earnings-call analyses. Missing values stay missing and are never estimated.

By FN2 Research · Updated · As of 2026-10-24. For educational purposes only; not investment advice.