DICK'S Reported $3.50 GAAP and $3.53 Non-GAAP. Three Cents Apart Is the Strange Part.

by Henry Nakamura · August 25, 2026

Earnings Reporter, Earnings Dispatch

DICK'S Sporting Goods reported second-quarter results before Tuesday's opening bell for the 13 weeks ended August 1, 2026, and the two earnings-per-share figures at the top of the release sit almost on top of each other: $3.50 on a GAAP basis and $3.53 on a non-GAAP basis. A three-cent spread is unremarkable in isolation. It is unusual for a retailer in the middle of an integration for which it told investors, in the same document, that it expects total pre-tax charges of up to $750 million.

The reason the two numbers converge is that the quarter's adjusting items pushed in opposite directions. According to the earnings release, DICK'S removed $29.3 million of Foot Locker acquisition-related costs and $15.3 million of charges tied to what it calls a store operating model redesign from its non-GAAP results. It also removed $38.1 million of tariff refunds received under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act that were attributable to prior periods. The first two add to non-GAAP earnings; the last subtracts from them. Netted and tax-effected, GAAP net income of $315.5 million became non-GAAP net income of $318.5 million.

Extend the same reconciliation to the first 26 weeks of the year and it runs the other way. Year-to-date GAAP earnings per diluted share were $7.04; non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $6.43. The GAAP figure is the higher of the two, which is the opposite of the arrangement most investors have been trained to expect. The reason is a line the company describes as $150.0 million in income received, net of legal fees, from a settlement on credit and debit card interchange fees, plus $24.5 million received from a landlord for the early termination of a store lease. Both are in GAAP results and both are stripped out of the non-GAAP figure.

On the top line the quarter was dominated by the acquisition. Consolidated net sales were $5,586.8 million, up 53.2% from $3,646.6 million a year earlier, a comparison that reflects the fact that Foot Locker did not join the company until the deal closed on September 8, 2025. Of the second-quarter total, the DICK'S business contributed $3,849.9 million and the Foot Locker business $1,736.9 million.

The comparable-sales lines are where the two businesses part company. On the proforma basis the company uses, DICK'S comparable sales rose 4.9% and Foot Locker's fell 3.6%, for a consolidated proforma figure of 2.1%. Over the first half the pattern is the same, if less severe: DICK'S up 5.4%, Foot Locker down 1.6%, consolidated up 3.0%.

The margin lines carry the same crosscurrents as the earnings lines and they do not point the same way. Gross profit was $1,943.3 million, or 34.78% of net sales, on a GAAP basis, and $1,902.8 million, or 34.06%, on a non-GAAP basis, so the reported margin is the higher one. Most of the $40.5 million separating them is the $38.1 million of prior-period tariff refunds, which sits above the operating line. Below it, the order reverses: GAAP operating income was $440.8 million, or 7.89% of sales, against non-GAAP operating income of $453.3 million, or 8.11%.

Against the year-ago quarter, both measures fell, and by different amounts. GAAP earnings per diluted share went from $4.71 to $3.50, a decline of $1.21. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share went from $4.38 to $3.53, a decline of $0.85. The year-ago quarter, it is worth repeating, contained no Foot Locker at all.

Alongside the results DICK'S revised its full-year fiscal 2026 outlook, and the revision is where the news sits. The company now expects consolidated net sales of $21.9 billion to $22.2 billion, GAAP operating income of $1.45 billion to $1.55 billion, non-GAAP operating income of $1.46 billion to $1.56 billion, GAAP earnings per diluted share of $10.94 to $11.94 and non-GAAP earnings per diluted share of $11.00 to $12.00, on roughly 90 million diluted shares and an effective tax rate of about 29%.

In the first-quarter release dated May 27, 2026, the same company guided to net sales of $22.1 billion to $22.4 billion, GAAP earnings per diluted share of $13.27 to $14.27, non-GAAP earnings per diluted share of $13.50 to $14.50, GAAP operating income of $1.69 billion to $1.81 billion, and a tax rate of approximately 27%. The non-GAAP earnings range has therefore come down by $2.50 a share at both ends. The segment detail explains most of it: in May, the Foot Locker business was guided to proforma comparable sales of positive 1.5% to positive 3.0% and segment profit of $110 million to $150 million. It is now guided to proforma comparable sales of negative 2.0% to zero and a segment loss of $40 million to $80 million. The DICK'S business kept its comparable-sales range of positive 2.5% to positive 4.0%, with segment profit guided to $1.54 billion to $1.60 billion against $1.60 billion to $1.68 billion in May.

Executive Chairman Ed Stack said the DICK'S business delivered a strong second quarter with broad-based growth across categories, and that as the quarter progressed conditions across portions of the athletic footwear and apparel marketplace became increasingly promotional. President and Chief Executive Lauren Hobart said the company delivered comparable-sales growth of 4.9% in the DICK'S business and gained market share.

A note on the comparison being drawn elsewhere. Kiplinger's weekly earnings calendar, accessed August 25, listed DICK'S at $3.76 a share for the quarter, attributing its estimates to Refinitiv, an LSEG business, via Yahoo Finance and to S&P Global Market Intelligence via Briefing.com, but without stating whether that figure was compiled on a GAAP or an adjusted basis. DICK'S reported $3.50 GAAP and $3.53 non-GAAP. Which of those two the $3.76 was meant to be measured against changes the size of the shortfall, and the release itself does not answer that question — only the estimate provider can.

The balance sheet carries the acquisition too. Cash and cash equivalents stood at $913.7 million at August 1, down from $1,231.0 million a year earlier, and inventories were $5,565.3 million against $3,403.9 million a year earlier — an increase of about 63% on those two figures, a calculation from the balance sheet rather than a percentage the release states. The company operated 3,104 stores. It said it has incurred $125.8 million of Foot Locker-related charges through the first 26 weeks and expects $200 million in fiscal 2026 in total, with the balance of the up-to-$750 million figure spread over what it describes as the medium term.