Margin story · Q3 2024 – Q2 2026
Last quarter’s 49.2% gross margin looks great, but it got a massive boost from a tariff refund. Before that, Nike’s gross margin had fallen from 45.4% to roughly 40% over five quarters. Tonight we’ll get a much cleaner look at whether margins are actually improving, especially with operating margin clearing 10% just once since mid-2024.
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That wraps up our initial coverage of Nike’s Q1 results. Thank you for stopping by!
Tune in to the earnings call at 5 PM EST for more updates.
Technical setup
4:37pm ET
At $35.15 the stock has already slipped through its 52-week low of $35.16, leaving open space below the price after guidance came in well below Street estimates. Any bounce has to clear $36.85 first, and the 50-day average at $39.11 and 200-day at $48.89 sit far above, so reclaiming the low is the only near-term test that matters.
Cramer's read on Nike's first-quarter results lands on the one line that decides whether the turnaround is real: cleaner inventory means less discounting and better margins ahead.
I will say this: Nike inventories are down!
Valuation · as of Oct 1
4:15pm ET
At $35.15, Nike is sitting right at its 52-week low of $35.16 and nearly 53% below the $74.51 high, with revenue down 1.1% year over year. Trailing 17x against a forward 21x says the market expects earnings to shrink before they recover, yet the $45.63 consensus target implies about 30% upside, and 25 of 39 analysts still sit on hold.
Insider activity — last 90 days
4:20pm ET
Nike insiders bought 3.26 million shares across 19 transactions in the past 90 days, led by director Travis Knight's 2,850,717-share purchase on July 30 and a September 1 cluster that included CEO Elliott Hill (108,400 shares) and CFO David Denton (71,234). The 22 sells, totaling about $1.9 million, are routine plan and tax-withholding activity.
Nike’s Q1 numbers were mixed, but the outlook is much harder to ignore. Management expects fiscal 2027 adjusted EPS of $1.15 to $1.35, well below the $1.65 analysts expected, while revenue is expected to decline by a high-single-digit percentage.
That helps explain why the stock is selling off despite Nike beating Q1 EPS estimates and gross margin expectations.
Additionally, Greater China revenue fell 22% year over year to $1.18 billion, missing analysts’ $1.3 billion estimate. Nike Direct also fell 8% and digital sales dropped 13%, showing the weakness goes beyond a single market.
North America was the bright spot, growing 2%, but it wasn’t enough to keep total revenue from falling 4% year-over-year.
Nike just reported fiscal Q1 earnings, with shares initially down 5% following the report. Here are the key numbers:
Quick Read:
Thesis check
4:05pm ET
Strip out the tariff refund, and Nike's core business is still eroding, which is why the stock sits at its 52-week low into tonight. A clean gross margin above 42% with a firmer recovery timeline from management would push this back to intact.
Balance sheet · Q3 2024 – Q2 2026
3:15pm ET
Nike rebuilt its cash position to $7.6 billion in Q2 FY2026 and trimmed net debt back to $3.5 billion, the healthiest reading in a year, so tonight's turnaround update is being judged against a balance sheet that can fund inventory cleanup on its own terms. The current ratio at 1.96 is the tightest in the eight quarters shown, worth keeping an eye on if management leans harder on markdowns.
$-3.2B$-3.9B$-4.6B
Tracked 13F positioning
3:05pm ET
$167M+12%
$135M+2.9%
$60M+12%
$28M—
$20M+5.7%
$13M+1.6%
$3M-0.7%
$516K—
+ 1 more tracked holder
As of Jun 30, 2026 quarter end · 13F disclosures lag ~45 days — long positions only, tracked filers only.
Among the eight filers we track, five added to Nike as of the June 30 disclosure, with Renaissance Technologies lifting its share count nearly 12% to a $167 million position at the top of the list. Those filings are roughly 45 days stale and predate tonight's earnings report, covering only positioning as of quarter end, which closed with one exit, one trimmer, and no fresh entries.
Reddit hype check
3:00pm ET
Retail chatter into tonight's earnings report is thin and sour, with the most-engaged wallstreetbets thread of the week asking whether Nike can fall to $20. The boards are pricing downside, sentiment that sets up a low bar for any upside surprise.
50.028.57.04
r/wallstreetbets
Could Nike fall to $20 ?
138 upvotes · 109 comments
Technical setup
2:55pm ET
Nike goes into tonight's report sitting at $36.08, less than a dollar above its 52-week low of $35.16 and with support at $35.35 as the only thing underneath. Resistance at $36.85 is the first test on a positive reaction, though the 50-day at $39.11 and the 200-day at $48.89 show how far the stock sits below trend. A break under $35.35 puts it at levels not seen in the past year.
Prediction markets
2:50pm ET
Traders on Polymarket are leaning heavily toward Nike clearing the $0.45 GAAP EPS bar tonight, pricing roughly three-in-four odds of a beat even with management guiding revenue down low to mid single digits.
Options positioning
2:45pm ET
Options expiring Thursday are priced for a violent reaction, with at-the-money implied volatility at 145.9% on the $35.50 strike. The 0.89 put/call ratio and the stack of puts at $35 and $36 show traders paying up for downside protection into the report, though crowded hedges can just as easily fuel a squeeze with a strong quarter.
4.3k / 180
901 / 194
8.6k / 1.4k
3.1k / 971
7.5k / 4.8k
3k / 3.3k
Call preview · Q1 2027
2:35pm ET
Turnaround progress has come up on every one of the last three calls, alongside the Greater China reset and the Sportswear and Classics franchise cleanup, so the after-hours move likely hinges on whether management puts a firmer timeline on the recovery rather than on the headline numbers. The gross margin question feeds straight into the other standing thread: the path back to double-digit EBIT margins.
This live blog is being updated by Thomas Richmond, a 24/7 Wall St. contributor. Simply stay on this page, and new updates will appear below automatically.
We expect Nike to release Q1 earnings shortly after 4:15 p.m. ET.
Nike heads into fiscal Q1 earnings with little room for error. Management guided for revenue to fall by a low- to mid-single-digit percentage, while Wall Street expects roughly $11.3 billion in sales and $0.44 per share in earnings.
Last quarter, Nike’s Q4 gross margin jumped 890 basis points to 49.2%, but almost all of that improvement came from a roughly 900-basis-point tariff refund benefit.
This quarter should give investors a much clearer view of whether the company’s underlying turnaround is actually improving profitability.
Greater China revenue fell sharply last quarter, and current estimates call for another 12.6% decline in Q1.
With Nike shares already reflecting considerable skepticism about the turnaround, clean margin improvement and signs of stabilization in China could be among the most important factors to watch tonight, besides the EPS number.
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