American Eagle: Aerie strength offsets AE struggles

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American Eagle: Aerie strength offsets AE struggles

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American Eagle

Aerie strength offsets AE struggles

Reiterate Rating: UNDERPERFORM | PO: 16.00 USD | Price: 17.92 USD

Profit guidance unchanged, but lots of moving pieces 29 May 2026

Aerie’s 25% comp growth was weighed down by AE, where comps turned negative. Equity

Higher investments mean stronger comp guidance failed to translate into a F26

operating profit increase. We think uncertainty on AE comp trajectory and continued

Key Changespressure from investments temper upside and reiterate our Underperform rating. We are

lowering our F26/F27 EPS ests. by 4%/13% and our price objective to $16 (was $20), (US$) Previous Current

based on 4x F27 EV/EBITDA (was 5x). We think a deeper discount to historical average is Price Obj. 20.00 16.00

warranted given struggles at AE, its largest brand. 2027E Rev (m) 5,716.2 5,725.3

2028E Rev (m) 5,924.3 5,925.6

2029E Rev (m) 6,154.7 6,146.8Aerie is the growth engine

Aerie’s strength was broad-based, with growth across channels, Aerie apparel comping 2027E EPS 1.76 1.69

45%, intimates +HSD, and sleep continuing to scale. The customer metrics were also 2028E EPS 1.83 1.59

strong, with traffic, conversion, and AOV improving, while it added ~1mn new customers. 2029E EPS 1.89 1.62

American Eagle stalled in 1Q Lorraine Hutchinson, CFA

Research Analyst

American Eagle’s progress stalled, with revenue and comps both down 2%, marking its BofAS

first negative comp quarter since 2Q25 as women’s bottoms, including denim, pressured +1 646 855 0951 lorraine.hutchinson@bofa.com

the brand. Management cited continued strength in men’s, along with women’s tops, but

Ryan Abbadi

those were not enough to offset bottoms pressure and a store-driven comp decline. The Research Analyst