Why The Gap, Inc. (GAP) Went Up on Friday

We recently compiled a list of the 10 Stocks End With Solid Performance. In this article, we are going to take a look at where The Gap, Inc. (NYSE:GAP) stands against the other stocks.

The stock market ended the trading week in the green territory with all major indices recording gains as investors digested latest US jobs data which fell short of expectations.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq posted the largest gain with 0.70 percent, followed by the S&P 500 with 0.55 percent, and the Dow Jones by 0.52 percent.

Ten companies across mixed sectors also mirrored a broader market optimism, booking modest gains during the end of the trading week. In this article, we have named the 10 top performers on Friday and detailed the reasons behind their performance.

To come up with the list, we considered only the stocks with at least $2 billion in market capitalization and $5 million in daily trading volume.

A customer shopping in a department store, browsing through racks of clothing.

The Gap, Inc. (NYSE:GAP)

The Gap, Inc. (NYSE:GAP) soared by 18.84 percent on Friday to end at $23.15 apiece as investors cheered news of impressive earnings performance in the fourth quarter and fiscal year ending February 2025.

In its latest earnings release, The Gap, Inc. (NYSE:GAP) said it achieved an 11.3-percent increase in net income during the quarter at $206 million from $185 million despite net sales decreasing by 3.5 percent to $4.15 billion from $4.3 billion.

Meanwhile, net income for the full year surged by 68 percent to $844 million from $502 million year-on-year, while net sales inched up by 1.3 percent to $15.086 billion from $14.889 billion.

Following the results, the company announced a dividend of $0.165 per share, representing a 10-percent increase compared with the fourth quarter of the fiscal year 2024.

Looking ahead, The Gap, Inc. (NYSE:GAP) said it targets to book between a 1 and 2 percent increase in net sales for the full year 2025, and flat net sales for the first quarter period.

Overall GAP ranks 1st on our list of Friday’s top performers. While we acknowledge the potential of GAP as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than GAP but trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.

READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and Complete List of 59 AI Companies Under $2 Billion in Market Cap

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.