Phone Sales Push Profit at Best Buy

Growth in its expanding cellphone business helped the electronics retail chain Best Buy post a 60 percent increase in second-quarter net income on Tuesday.

Best Buy sounded an optimistic note about the holiday season and raised its guidance for the year, but the chief executive, Brian J. Dunn, cautioned that shoppers were still “highly selective” in their spending.

“We believe, however, that this will change in our favor over the back half of the year,” Mr. Dunn said. “Customers traditionally rotate their spending to our categories during the holiday shopping season and a strong lineup of products coming across the board reinforces our confidence.”

In the three months ended Aug. 28, revenue in stores open at least 14 months, a crucial indicator, edged down 0.1 percent and sales of flat-screen TVs continued to be weak. That was offset by strength at Best Buy Mobile, which Best Buy has been aggressively expanding.

So far this fiscal year, 34 Best Buy Mobile stores have opened for a total of 110. At least 50 more are to open by the end of the year, including 11 this month. There also are 1,100 Mobile areas within regular Best Buy stores.

Second-quarter net income rose to $254 million, or 60 cents a share. That compares with $158 million, or 37 cents a share, last year.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters predicted net income of 44 cents a share.

Revenue rose 3 percent, to $11.34 billion, from $11.02 billion in the quarter a year earlier.

Sales of TVs, video game consoles, video games, music and movies fell. TVs have been a weak spot for electronics sellers as prices decline less steeply than in the past.

Domestic revenue rose 3 percent, to $8.4 billion, while international revenue rose 6 percent, to $2.9 billion.

Best Buy said its domestic market share fell slightly in the quarter because of a shortage of Apple iPads during the early days after its release and because of continued weakness in entertainment software and fewer home theater sales.