Costco Wholesale () reporte🐽d🅺 better-than-expected earnings for its second quarter of fiscal 2024, but sales growth was weaker than anticipated. The company's shares fell more than 4% in after-hours trading.

Net income for the quarter ending Feb. 18 came in at $1.74 billion, or $3.92 per diluted share. Costco said that the bottom line benefitted from a $94 million, or $0.21 per share, tax benefit. EPS was up from $3.30 in the year-earlier period and handily topped analysts' expectations of $3.62.

Net sales increased 5.7% to $57.33 billion, less than the 6.8% growth that analysᩚᩚᩚ🍷ᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚts had expected based on the strong holiday sales numbers that Costco had previously announced.

The company said that comparable store sales rose 5.6% during the fiscal second quarter versus the year-earlier period. Growth in same-store sales ꦗwas 4.3% in the U.🀅S., 9.2% in Canada and 8.6% in other international locations.

Costco also announced Thursday that net sales for the four weeks through March 3 totaled $18.21 billion, a 6.9% increase over the com⛦parable period a year earlierꦜ.

Investors will be looking for commentary from management during the earnings call, especially as Richard Galanti steps away as the company's finance chief after almost 40 years to make way for former Kroger Co. (KR) CFO Gary Millerchip.

Costco shares were down 4.1% at $753.70 in after-hours trading at around 5:00 p.m. ET. Through Thursday's close, the stock had gained about 20% since the start of the year.