Analyst Note
| Erin Lash, CFA |Even though it was compared against a weak performance a year ago, when open-store comparable sales slumped 3% and led to a 0.5% operating margin loss, narrow-moat TJX reported solid second-quarter results. The firm posted 20% open-only comparable sales and 11% adjusted operating margins (50 basis points better than the prepandemic period in fiscal 2020). Similar to other retailers, management noted that traffic in the U.S. was up by midsingle digits compared with before the pandemic, which we think speaks to consumers’ penchant for venturing outside their homes as the dissemination of vaccines has expanded.