Costco Wholesale Corporation · COST · FY2025 Q3 · Calendar Q2 2025

Costco: Growth remains strong, but margins and renewals bear watching

The supplied call analysis supports a constructive but qualified view of Costco's operating trajectory: membership, warehouse expansion, private label, gasoline and digital initiatives support continued growth, while margin, tariff, capacity and renewal-rate risks require monitoring.

Reported After market closeNASDAQConsumer Defensive $408.29B market cap
80quality score

Earnings scorecard

Reported versus consensus
Reported EPS — Consensus $4.25
EPS surprise — Reported versus consensus
Reported revenue — Consensus $63.11B
Revenue surprise — Reported versus consensus

Market reaction

event-close to next-session close
Stock move +3.1% Event window
SPY move -0.1% Same window
Abnormal move +3.2% Stock minus SPY
Volume 2.9× Versus trailing sessions
Subsequent drift -4.8% Up to 20 sessions
COSTSPY benchmark

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Transcript intelligence

What changed

Compared with the prior-quarter analysis, the current call analysis adds a larger membership base, nine warehouse openings and ten planned Q4 openings, stronger reported profit and sales growth, and new digital initiatives including Affirm BNPL and checkout pilots. Renewal rates softened slightly, and a $130 million LIFO charge plus higher SG&A offset part of the gross-margin improvement.

Guidance delta

No formal guidance was provided in the supplied transcript analysis; the prior quarter was described as maintained.

Key takeaways

  • The transcript analysis describes 13% net-income growth and 8% sales growth in Q3 FY2025.
  • Membership households grew 6.8% to 79.6 million, while renewal rates slipped slightly with digital sign-ups.
  • Gross-margin improvement in fresh and food categories was partly offset by a $130 million LIFO charge and higher SG&A.
  • Warehouse expansion, Kirkland sourcing, gasoline throughput and digital checkout initiatives remain central growth levers.
  • The main counterweights are tariffs, inflation, foreign exchange, capacity limits and renewal-rate risk.

Management priorities

  • Continue warehouse expansion and international growth.
  • Expand gasoline-station hours and throughput.
  • Scale the Affirm buy-now-pay-later program and digital checkout pilots.
  • Increase local Kirkland sourcing to reduce tariff exposure.
  • Invest in logistics and warehouse technology.

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Earnings History

Estimate Beat Miss Match
COST REVENUE earnings history estimate and actual scatter chart 8 reported fiscal quarters and 2 future estimate-only quarters. Q2 '24 estimate $59B Q2 '24 actual $58B, miss Q3 '24 estimate $58B Q3 '24 actual $59B, beat Q4 '24 estimate $80B Q4 '24 actual $80B, miss Q4 '25 estimate $86B Q4 '25 actual $86B, beat Q1 '26 estimate $67B Q1 '26 actual $67B, beat Q2 '26 estimate $69B Q2 '26 actual $70B, beat Q3 '26 estimate $70B Q3 '26 actual $71B, beat Q4 '26 estimate $95B Q4 '26 actual $94B, miss Q1 '27 estimate $74B Q2 '27 estimate $77B

Analyst Consensus ?

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

Analyst 52W Price Targets

$920.65Current
$491Low
$927.5Average
$1,275High

Latest persisted target per named analyst; persisted current price from FN2's market snapshot as of Oct 3, 2026. Not an FN2 forecast.

Firm-level rating actions

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

FirmRatingPrior ratingActionDate
Deutsche Bank Buy BuyMaintainSep 28, 2026
Argus Research Buy BuyMaintainSep 28, 2026
Wells Fargo Equal Weight Equal WeightMaintainSep 25, 2026
Truist Securities Hold HoldMaintainSep 25, 2026
Roth Capital Sell SellMaintainSep 25, 2026
Show 54 more rating actions

Named analyst price targets

Upside is calculated against the persisted current price $920.65. FMP does not supply a rating on these named-analyst rows.

FirmAnalyst52W targetPrice when postedUpsideDate
Deutsche BankKrisztina Katai$1,079$929.26 +17.2%Sep 28, 2026
Truist FinancialAnalyst unavailable$955$919.13 +3.7%Sep 25, 2026
D.A. DavidsonAnalyst unavailable$1,040$919.5 +13.0%Sep 25, 2026
Robert W. BairdAnalyst unavailable$1,175$896.48 +27.6%Sep 25, 2026
BernsteinAnalyst unavailable$1,143$896.48 +24.2%Sep 25, 2026
See 125 more

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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

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Sources

  1. Earnings call transcript and parsed analysis · 2026-05-11T10:29:34.698584+00:00
  2. FN2 earnings calendar · 2025-05-15T00:01:33.065679+00:00
  3. Polygon adjusted daily market bars · 2026-10-03T13:06:14.282337+00:00
  4. Financial Modeling Prep analyst price-target consensus and quote snapshot · 2026-10-03T13:06:14.279595+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 2026-10-03. For educational purposes only; not investment advice.