As retail earnings continue to come out this week, the good seems to be outweighing the bad. L Brands (LB) posted Q4 EPS of $1.89 after yesterday’s closing bell, a good $0.11 higher than what the Estimize community was calling for. Revenues of $4.07B also beat, but only by a margin of $42M. The owner of Victoria’s Secret and Bath and Body Works, among others, saw robust holiday sales along with successful semi-annual sales held in January. The L Brands customer is a loyal one that has not slowed down their consumption of premium lingerie and personal care products, while in the broader sense U.S. shoppers have been reluctant to allocate disposable income to traditional retailers as they once did.

One retailer being hurt by this reluctance is Chico’s (CHS). This morning the women’s apparel retailer reported EPS of $0.05, beating the Estimize consensus by $0.02 and the Street by $0.01. This is the first time the company has reported positive EPS since Q4 2012. Revenues were also a beat coming in at $657M vs. the Estimize prediction of $639M. Despite the beats, the company has been struggling for sometime now, and as such announced that they would be cutting 240 existing positions and closing 120 stores between 2015 - 2017 in an effort to reorganize. Investors rewarded the move, the stock is now up 2%.

This afternoon we get results from fellow retailers J.C. Penney, Gap and Ross Stores.

How are we doing?

Expectations for S&P 500 earnings growth for the fourth quarter stand at 6.4%. Revenues are anticipated to come in with 1.6% growth.

Leaders

Earnings:

Health Care (24.2%). Notable industry: Biotechnology (65.0%).

Information Technology (17.6%). Notable industry: Semiconductors (32.0%)

Revenues:

Health Care (10.7%). Notable industry: Biotech (42.8%).

Information Technology (8.2%). Notable industry: Tech Hardware, Storage & Peripherals (15.6%)

Laggards

Earnings:

Energy (-19.5%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels (-20.8%)

Financials (-3.4%). Notable industry: Banks (-4.8%)

Revenues:

Energy (-13.3%). Notable industry: Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels (­-15.5%).

Materials (-2.2%). Notable industry: Paper & Forest Products (­-18.0%).

Beat/Miss/Match

Earnings: With 448 S&P 500 companies reporting thus far, 55% have beaten the Estimize consensus, 37% have missed and 8% have met. This is compared to Wall Street estimates, of which 68% of companies have beat on the bottom­-line, 22% have missed and 10% have met.

Revenue: 49% have beaten the Estimize consensus, while 51% have missed. For revenues, 56% of companies have beat the Wall Street estimate, while 44% have missed.