Macy’s reported stronger-than-expected sales for the third quarter, but it will delay releasing its full quarterly results due to an employee hiding up to $154 million in expenses over several years. The department store chain found that a single employee intentionally made accounting errors in delivery expense accounting, leading to roughly $132 million to $154 million of expenses being hidden.
The company had expected to report its quarterly results on Tuesday but now says it’s completing an independent investigation into the issue. Macy’s has identified no impact on its cash management activities or vendor payments. The person behind the conduct is no longer an employee, and there’s no indication that others were involved.
Macy’s said its sales fell 2.4% to $4.74 billion, slightly above analyst estimates. However, comparable sales for established physical and online channels were down 2.4%, excluding licensed businesses like cosmetics. Bloomingdale’s and Bluemercury saw different sales performance: Bloomingdale’s rose 1%, while Bluemercury’s increased by 3.3%.
Macy’s renovated stores, called the First 50, had a comparable sales gain of 1.9%. Shares fell 3.3% in afternoon trading following the news.
The company emphasized its commitment to ethical conduct and vowed to complete the investigation as soon as possible while focusing on serving customers during the holiday season.
Source: https://apnews.com/article/macys-accounting-quarter-b1cb0927d9b6a58ee4396838df7973c9