Will Costco Have Reason to Celebrate This Holiday Season?

The holiday season is an essential one for retailers across the industry, and even businesses such as Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ: COST) that have extensive grocery operations still see a huge bump to their results during the last two months of the year. Costco differs from most of its peers in that its fiscal year splits the holiday shopping season into two separate fiscal quarters, with the results it will announce in the next week covering the key Thanksgiving weekend period while most of December will fall into the following quarter.

When Costco releases its fiscal first-quarter results on Dec. 14, investors will look to see how that critical period has gone. Yet they'll also want to know more about how the retail giant is fighting back against competition both from other big-box retailers and from online e-commerce specialists. Let's take an early look at what to expect from Costco's impending report and whether shareholders should prepare to celebrate.

Expected EPS Growth

Source: Fool.com