Costco's total company comparable sales rose 9.4% in Q4, but excluding gasoline prices and foreign exchange, the figure is 6.7%. The US gap is wider still: 10.7% reported against 7.2% adjusted. Digitally-enabled is the one place the spread flips, at 19.5% reported and 19.8% adjusted. Costco's in-line Q3 report sent shares down 3.91%, so investors will likely focus on the adjusted comparable sales figures during the 5 p.m. ET earnings call rather than the stronger headline numbers.
Coverage ended
16 updates · Last at 5:07pm ET
Live: Will Costco Crush Q4 Earnings Tonight After the Market Closes?
Live Updates
Newest firstCostco Q4 Earnings Coverage Wrap-Up
That wraps up our initial coverage of Costco’s Q4 results. Thank you for stopping by!
Costco Ends Fiscal 2026 With a $20 Billion Cash War Chest
Costco’s cash generation soared in fiscal 2026, with operating cash flow reaching $15.83 billion, up nearly 19% from $13.34 billion last year. This came even as spending on property and equipment increased to $6.44 billion.
Costco ended the year with $20.21 billion in cash, up more than $6 billion from $14.16 billion a year earlier. The company also returned capital to shareholders, spending $848 million on share repurchases and $2.46 billion on dividends during the year.
Costco’s Q4 Earnings Beat Comes With a $0.15 Tariff Boost
Costco reported $6.75 in diluted EPS, up 15% from $5.87 a year ago and ahead of the $6.53 Wall Street consensus. But part of that growth came from a one-time benefit.
The company said IEEPA tariff refunds added $0.15 per share to Q4 earnings, after accounting for some of the refunds Costco reinvested into increased value for members.
Excluding that benefit, EPS would have been roughly $6.60, still enough to clear Wall Street’s estimate. Net income increased nearly 15% to $3.00 billion.
Costco’s Q4 Sales Jump 11% as Digital Growth Nears 20%
Costco finished fiscal 2026 with another quarter of strong growth. Net sales increased 11.2% to $93.9 billion, while total company comparable sales rose 9.4%. Excluding gasoline prices and foreign exchange, comparable sales increased 6.7%.
The standout was digitally enabled sales, which climbed 19.5% reported and 19.8% adjusted. U.S. comparable sales rose 10.7%, or 7.2% after adjusting for gas and currency movements.
Costco's Q4 Sales Jump 9.4%, but Investors Should Watch This Number Instead
Costco Q4 Earnings Are Out - Stock Pops 1% on Results
Costco just reported fiscal fourth-quarter earnings, with shares initially up about 1% following the report. The warehouse retailer delivered beats on both the top and bottom lines.
- Revenue: $95.72 billion vs. $94.89 billion expected
- EPS: $6.75 vs. $6.53 expected
Quick Read:
- Costco beat EPS estimates by 3.4%, with earnings per share growing roughly 15% year over year.
- Revenue increased 11.1% year over year, coming in nearly $1 billion ahead of Wall Street expectations.
- The initial reaction is positive, with $COST shares popping about 1% immediately after the release.
Investors will now be watching membership trends, margins, and management’s fiscal 2027 commentary on the earnings call.
Costco Heads Into Q4 With a Fortress Balance Sheet
Balance sheet · Q3 2024 – Q2 2026
$13.28BNet cash
Costco walks into tonight's report with $13.3 billion in net cash as of Q2 2026, up from roughly flat net debt two years ago, after cutting total debt to $5.7 billion. That gives management room to absorb any core-on-core margin pressure, keep funding warehouse expansion, and revisit a special dividend while keeping the balance sheet intact.
Net cash by quarter
Analysts See 19% Upside for Costco at 40x Earnings
Valuation · as of Sep 24
$897.72-0.8%Target $1,069.20 · +19.1%
52-wk low $840.3552-wk high $1,094.76
- Trailing P/E
- 45.3×
- Forward P/E
- 39.6×
- PEG
- 3.9×
- Price/Sales
- 1.4×
- EV/EBITDA
- 26.8×
- Price/Book
- 11.9×
Costco heads into tonight's numbers at 45x trailing earnings while revenue grows 11.6%, a multiple that leaves little room for a soft quarter. Shares sit near the low end of the 52-week range at $897.72 against a $1,094.76 high, yet the consensus target of $1,069.20 still implies a wide gap to close.
Insiders Are Buying Ahead of Costco's Q4 Earnings
Insider activity — last 90 days
- Bought
- 29.7K shares7 buys
- Sold
- $9.2M8 sales · 15.4K shares
Buys 66% of shares traded
- Sep 10RIEL, PIERREExecutive Vice PresidentBuy4,552 sh
- Sep 10FRATES, CATONExecutive Vice PresidentBuy4,552 sh
- Sep 10RUBANENKO, YORAMExecutive Vice PresidentBuy4,129 sh
- Sep 10WILCOX, WILLIAM RICHARDExecutive Vice PresidentBuy4,129 sh
- Sep 10ADAMO, CLAUDINEExecutive Vice PresidentBuy4,129 sh
Five Costco executive vice presidents all bought on September 10, two weeks before tonight's report, likely as part of their compensation. This was part of seven insider buys totaling 29,749 shares over the past 90 days. Pierre Riel and Caton Frates each picked up 4,552 shares. The eight sells in the window, 15,407 shares for $9.2 million, look routine.
Costco's Bull vs Bear Case Ahead of Q4 Earnings Tonight
Thesis check
intact$899.06 -0.6% today
“Costco's membership flywheel earns its premium multiple through any consumer slowdown”
Bull case
- gross margin holding in a narrow 12.5% to 13.1% band, showing pricing discipline rather than margin giveback
- Wall Street looking for $94.85 billion in revenue and $6.53 EPS, capping fiscal 2026 with another double-digit growth period
- membership growth and warehouse expansion still the core call agenda, not a defensive turnaround story
Bear case
- core-on-core margin the pressure point investors flagged this morning, with tariff pass-through unresolved
- Q3 largely met expectations and shares still fell 3.91%, so meeting estimates is not enough
- stock enters the report below both its 50-day and 200-day moving averages
Tonight's setup leaves the flywheel argument intact, and the Q3 reaction tips the balance: a quarter that merely meets estimates already knocked nearly 4% off the stock. Core-on-core margin commentary decides whether this reads as strengthening or weakening by tomorrow's open.
Top Hedge Funds That Are Buying Costco
Tracked 13F positioning
$3.6Bacross 9 tracked filers
4 added · 2 trimmed · 2 exited
- Marshall Wace LLP$1.1B—
- Two Sigma Investments LLC$941M+0.2%
- D. E. Shaw & Co Inc$817M-0.0%
- Millennium Management LLC$356M+1.8%
- Balyasny Asset Management LP$284M+1.1%
- Bridgewater Associates LP$25M-0.0%
- Gotham Asset Management LLC$23M+0.4%
- Brevan Howard$22M—
+ 3 more tracked holders
As of Jun 30, 2026 quarter end · 13F disclosures lag ~45 days — long positions only, tracked filers only.
Among the nine filers we track, positioning into tonight's report skewed toward accumulation as of June 30, with four buyers against two trimmers and two exits, led by Millennium roughly tripling its share count. Marshall Wace sits on top of the tracked list at about $1.1 billion. These are 13F disclosures roughly 45 days stale, so current positioning may differ.
Only 56% Chance Costco Beats Q4 Earnings Tonight
Prediction markets
Will Costco (COST) beat quarterly earnings?
56%Yes-21pp this week
Traders on Polymarket have cooled hard on a Costco earnings beat, with the yes side sliding 21 percentage points to near even odds ahead of tonight's report. That fading conviction lines up with the margin worries flagged this morning, and it sets up a sharper reaction either way once the numbers hit after the bell.
Yes probability
Traders Are Neutral on Costco With a 0.97 Put/Call Ratio
Options positioning
Put/call 0.97Balanced
CallsPuts
- ATM implied vol
- 57.1%
- Expiry
- Fri, Sep 25chain as of Wed, Sep 23
Friday-expiry options are priced for a real move, with at-the-money implied volatility at 57.1% around the 905 strike. The 0.97 put/call ratio reads as slightly defensive positioning into tonight's earnings report, and balanced readings like this often reflect hedging. Open interest clusters at 900 and 910 mark the levels traders are leaning on.
- $897.5249 / 216
- $900927 / 748
- $902.533 / 97
- $905348 / 312
- $907.552 / 82
- $910586 / 482
What Costco Stock Did Last Quarter After Earnings
Last quarter — Q3 2026
- EPS
- $4.93vs $4.92 est +0.1%
- Revenue
- $70.53Bvs $69.68B est +1.2%
Earnings-day move -3.9%Since report -9.7%
Q3 showed Costco can top both lines and still see shares fall, with the selling continuing in the four months since. That sets a high bar for tonight: topping estimates alone has not been enough, so margin detail and membership economics carry the reaction.
Price since the report
Reported Thu, May 28 · next print Thu, Sep 24
Analysts' Top Questions for Costco Ahead of Q4 Earnings Tonight
Call preview · Q4 2026
Thu, Sep 24
Earnings call · after close
Membership growth, warehouse expansion, digital and retail media, core-on-core margins and inflation have all come up on every one of the last four calls, making them familiar territory tonight. The swing factor is core-on-core margins and pricing, the thread we flagged this morning, because that is where tariff pass-through and Costco's habit of eating price shows up first. SG&A leverage, absent in Q4 25 but asked about in each quarter since, is the newer line of questioning worth tracking.
Q4 25Q1 26Q2 26Q3 26
- Membership growth & renewal rates
- Real estate & warehouse expansion
- Digital, delivery & retail media
- Core-on-core margins & pricing
- Inflation & ticket components
- SG&A leverage & productivity
Here’s What Costco Investors Are Watching Ahead of Q4 Earnings Tonight
Costco reports fiscal fourth-quarter earnings after the bell, with Wall Street expecting $94.85 billion in revenue and $6.53 in EPS. Those numbers would cap fiscal 2026 with another period of double-digit growth.
Costco’s Q3 report largely met expectations but still sent shares tumbling 3.91%. This time around, investors will be watching core-on-core margins closely, particularly for any impact from gasoline prices and other factors outside Costco’s underlying retail business.
Beyond the headline numbers, membership fee income and renewal trends remain key indicators of the strength of Costco’s model. Investors will also be listening for updates on tariff refund timing and management’s planned pace of new warehouse openings heading into fiscal 2027.
Costco still trades at roughly 45x earnings, while the consensus analyst price target of $1,069 implies around 18% upside. Any meaningful deterioration in core margins or spending trends, however, could put pressure on Costco stock heading into the new fiscal year.
Live coverage has ended. The full story is below.
Full Coverage
The story so farCostco (NASDAQ:COST | COST Price Prediction) is expected to report Q4 FY2026 today at 4:15 PM ET, with the earnings call scheduled for 5:00 PM ET. After a lukewarm reaction to Q3, this report closes fiscal 2026 and tests whether membership economics and digital velocity carried a roughly $95B quarter.
Momentum Meets a Cooler Reaction
Q3 FY26 delivered $70.53B in revenue, up 11.58% YoY, and $4.93 in EPS on comparable sales up 9.8%. However, shares fell 3.91% on the day and have not recovered, down 7.07% over the past month.
Reported gross margin slipped 21 basis points as management widened gas price gaps and cut Kirkland prices on eggs, meat, and staples. SG&A improved 20 basis points to 8.96%, membership fee income rose 10.7% to $1.373 billion, and executive penetration reached 75.0% of sales. Sentiment sits cooler than the operating trend.
Consensus Estimates
| Metric | Q4’26 Estimate | YoY Change | FY 2026 Estimate | FY 2027 Estimate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $94.85B | +10.1% | $301.96B | $326.63B |
| EPS (Normalized) | $6.5273 | +11.2% | $20.5605 | $22.663 |
Revisions have drifted higher into the report, with four upward Q4 revisions and zero cuts over the trailing seven days. FY27 modeling implies mid-teens EPS growth on roughly 8% top-line expansion. Setup: expectations high, but not stretched.
What I’m Watching Tonight: Kirkland Pricing, Margins, and Tariff Refunds
Tonight, I’ll be watching how core-on-core margin evolves after Q3’s nine basis point decline. It will be interesting to see if Kirkland cuts on Crispy Wings ($16.99 to $14.99), Chocolate Almonds, Golf Balls, and King Size Sheets pull traffic without denting profit density.
Analysts will focus on gas: the final five weeks of Q3 were the company’s top five volume weeks ever. Did that momentum hold, and did widened price gaps stabilize gas profit as a rate of sales?
Tariffs matter too. Management said IEPA refund claims could arrive on a rolling basis over the following two to three months, with a plan to return the pass-through portion to members. Any update could reshape the near-term margin bridge.
On membership, executive members grew to 41.2 million (+9.6%), while total paid members rose 4.1%. Investors will be looking for confirmation that growth sits in management’s 4% to 5% “normal” range. Finally, warehouse cadence: FY26 was trimmed to 26 net new openings, with a 30-plus-per-year pace still on the table.
Earnings History
| Quarter | EPS Surprise | 1-Day Move | 7-Day Move | 30-Day Move |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q3’26 | +0.14% | -3.91% | +1.63% | -3.31% |
| Q2’26 | +0.78% | +1.58% | +1.03% | +3.22% |
| Q1’26 | +5.19% | 0.00% | -3.26% | +8.17% |
| Q4’25 | +1.11% | -2.90% | -0.06% | +0.90% |
On average, shares moved -1.18% seven days after earnings across the past year’s beats.
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Thomas Richmond
Thomas Richmond is a financial writer and content strategist with 5+ years of experience covering stocks and financial markets. He has published over 500 articles focused on individual stock analysis, helping investors better understand business fundamentals, stock valuations, and long-term opportunities.
Thomas previously served as a Content Lead at TIKR, a stock research platform, where he helped scale the company’s blog to hundreds of articles per month and contributed to a weekly newsletter reaching more than 100,000 investors.
Outside of work, Thomas enjoys weight lifting and soccer.
