
Jim Cramer -- Watch Lowe's and Target Earnings, but Retail Can Be Treacherous
TheStreet's Jim Cramer is watching Lowe's (LOW) - Get Report and Target (TGT) - Get Report , two retail giants set to report quarterly results before the opening bell on Wednesday.
"These are the two that often trade -- Lowe's with Home Depot (HD) - Get Report -- so Lowe's is up very big," he said. "Target sometimes trades with Walmart (WMT) - Get Report and Target is not up that much."
Wall Street is looking for earnings per share of 78 cents on sales of about $14.3 billion from Lowe's. Analysts expect Target to post earnings per share of 86 cents on sales of roughly $17.6 billion.
"I think Target is going to be a big beneficiary of Star Wars. They've made the stores so that they've got the best Star Wars merchandise," he said, referring to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which will be released in theaters in December. "That said, they have apparel and apparel has been quite bad."
Cramer also offers one bit of advice before diving into the retail space. "When you buy retail these days, you take your life in your own hands," he said. "It's much better to be able to buy a biotech that's a major company right now, than a retailer. We own Target for Action Alerts PLUS and long term we believe [CEO] Brian Cornell is engineering a terrific turnaround."
Elsewhere in the retail space, Cramer was fond of Walmart's third-quarter earnings, along with results from Home Depot and TJX (TJX) - Get Report . "What do all three have in common? They aren't in the traditional mall," Cramer said.
"This is an important distinction because the weaknesses inMacy's (M) - Get Report and Nordstrom (JWN) - Get Report were about traffic and TJX cited traffic as robust. Home Depot [reported] masterful plus 7% comparable sales growth so we know they had traffic."
Meanwhile, retail stocks in the S&P 500 have slumped 10.3% since the start of the year.
At the time of publication, Jim Cramer's charitable trust Action Alerts PLUS was long TGT.








