Tariff Refunds Fuel Home Depot's Q2 Earnings Beat

Home Depot Inc (NYSE:HD) reported upbeat second-quarter results on Wednesday, sending its shares up 1.69% in premarket trading. Analysts say that tariff refunds did the heavy lifting in Home Depot's Q2 performance.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Steven Shemesh noted that total company comp sales grew 1.7%, but only due to an acceleration in ticket growth to 2.8%. This was partially offset by a 1.0% decline in transactions, according to Shemesh.

Shemesh also pointed out that gross margins benefited from $685 million worth of IEEPA tariff refunds, but this was slightly offset by higher transportation costs and the GMS and Mingledorff acquisitions.