Written by StockNews.com

Urban Outfitters, Inc. (NASDAQ: URBN) late Tuesday posted worse than expected first quarter earnings results, with sales at established stores declining 3.1% from last year.

The Philadelphia-based specialty retailer reported adjusted Q1:

• earnings per share (EPS) of $0.13, which was $0.02 worse than the Wall Street consensus estimate of $0.15. URBN noted that its higher tax rate in the first quarter hurt earnings by about $0.02 per share.
• Revenues fell 0.2% from last year to $761.2 million, also missing analysts’ view for $768.95 million.
• Comparable sales (comps) fell 3.1%...in a trend that’s become all too familiar for retailers throughout the past several quarters.
  • The company’s Free People branded stores actually saw comps rise 1.5% in Q1,
  • but comps fell 3.1% at Urban Outfitters
  • and 4.4% at Anthropologie.

Richard A. Hayne, Chief Executive Officer, commented via press release:

“During the first quarter we continued to see strong double-digit growth from our direct-to-consumer channel and our wholesale business. We believe we have significant opportunity to continue to grow both of these channels at all of our brands.”

...Year-to-date, URBN has declined -28.16%, versus a 7.87% rise in the benchmark S&P 500 index during the same period.