Nike beat quarterly profit expectations as deep cost cuts and lower taxes more than offset crumbling revenue in key markets like the United States and China, sending its shares up 4.4 per cent.
Nike's fiscal first-quarter net profit was $513.0 million, or $1.04 per share, compared with $510.5 million, or $1.03 per share, a year earlier. Analysts, on average, had expected 97 cents per share, according to Reuters Estimates.
Revenue fell 12 per cent to $4.8 billion from $5.4 billion a year earlier, when orders in advance of the Beijing Olympics and the European soccer championships boosted sales.
On a constant currency basis, revenues for the full year and second quarter are expected to fall from year-ago levels, Nike said.
The world's top athletic shoe and apparel maker stressed it was gaining market share and stood to benefit when the global economy improved. But executives warned that retailers and consumers remained wary going into the pivotal holiday season, which accounts for the bulk of most retailers' yearly sales.
"People are still going to be relatively cautious going through that holiday period," Nike Brand President Charlie Denson told analysts on a conference call, adding that Nike saw "sequential improvement" in retail orders through spring.
Nike and its rivals, Adidas and Puma, have been battling dwindling sales across the world as cash-strapped consumers reduce discretionary spending.
Revenue fell in all Nike's regions except Japan, which Mr Denson described as a country with "very cautious" consumers. But after accounting for currency fluctuations, sales were flat in Japan and rose in emerging markets, which included Brazil.
In China, a market with double-digit growth last year, sales fell 16 per cent. But Nike said the company continued to be the best-selling athletic brand in that country, led by basketball.
Revenues were even down 5 per cent in the historically fast-growing unit that sells non-Nike-branded goods.
Reuters