Updated: December 6, 2025
Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) heads into the final weeks of 2025 in a tricky spot: the retailer just posted a rare earnings miss, the stock is nearly 18% below where it traded a year ago, and investors are betting on Federal Reserve rate cuts to revive the housing and remodeling cycle.
MarketWatch
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At Friday’s close, Home Depot shares changed hands around $354–$355, giving the company a market capitalization of roughly $353 billion.
StockAnalysis
The stock sits well below its 52‑week high near $436, though still above its recent low around $326, and its one‑year total return is about ‑18%.
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Below is a deep dive into the latest news, forecasts and analysis on Home Depot stock as of December 6, 2025, designed for investors following HD on Google News and Discover.
Home Depot stock price and valuation snapshot
Recent data from multiple market sources show Home Depot trading at a premium to both its own history and many retail peers:
Last close: about $354.6 per share (Dec. 5, 2025).
MarketBeat
Market cap: roughly $353 billion; enterprise value around $417 billion.
StockAnalysis
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52‑week range: $326.31 – $436.36.
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Trailing P/E: ~24x; forward P/E: ~23x.
Yahoo Finance
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Price‑to‑sales: about 2.1x; EV/EBITDA: ~16x.
StockAnalysis
Dividend: $2.30 per quarter (annualized $9.20) for a ~2.6% yield, with a payout ratio just over 62%.
MarketBeat
Fundamental platforms such as Simply Wall St estimate a “fair value” for Home Depot around $301 per share, implying the stock is roughly 18% above their DCF‑based intrinsic value and trading at 24x earnings versus ~18x for the U.S. specialty retail industry.
Simply Wall St
In other words, HD still commands a quality premium despite its recent pullback.
Q3 2025 earnings: revenue beat, profit miss
Home Depot’s fiscal Q3 2025 (quarter ended November 2, 2025) was the pivotal event that reset expectations for the stock:
Net sales: $41.4 billion, up 2.8% year over year, with about $900 million contributed by the recently acquired GMS Inc.
The Home Depot
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Comparable sales: up 0.2% overall and 0.1% in the U.S., narrowly positive but below pre‑earnings Wall Street expectations.
The Home Depot
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GAAP EPS: $3.62, down 1.4% from $3.67 a year ago.
Home Depot Investor Relations
Adjusted EPS: $3.74 vs. $3.78 last year and below analyst estimates around $3.84, marking Home Depot’s second consecutive profit miss.
Investing.com
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MarketWatch
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Operating margin: slipped to 12.9% from 13.5% a year earlier; adjusted operating margin fell to 13.3%.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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Traffic and ticket: customer transactions declined about 1.4%, while average ticket rose roughly 2%, suggesting higher spend per visit but fewer trips.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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Management pointed to three main pressures:
Unusually mild storm activity, which reduced demand for repair and rebuild projects that typically follow hurricanes and major weather events.
The Home Depot
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MarketWatch
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Weak housing turnover, with U.S. home sales near multi‑decade lows and only about 28 transactions per 1,000 homes, limiting big‑ticket remodels.
AP News
Consumer uncertainty, particularly around discretionary projects, as higher living costs and elevated mortgage rates keep many homeowners cautious.
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The market reaction was swift: HD shares fell roughly 6% in a single session, their sharpest drop since early 2023, and have struggled to regain momentum since.
MarketWatch
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2025 guidance reset: slower earnings, modest growth
Alongside the Q3 report, Home Depot cut its earnings outlook for fiscal 2025 while modestly boosting its sales expectations:
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Investing.com
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Total sales growth: about 3% for the year, with GMS expected to add roughly $2 billion in incremental revenue.
The Home Depot
Comparable sales: now expected to be “slightly positive” for the comparable 52‑week period (down from about 1% growth previously).
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Adjusted EPS: projected to decline ~5% year over year; GAAP EPS to fall ~6% from $14.91 in fiscal 2024.
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Gross margin: around 33.2% and operating margin around 12.6% (about 13% on an adjusted basis).
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For investors, the message is clear: 2025 is a digestion year. Home Depot is absorbing:
Slower DIY demand
Weather and housing headwinds
Integration costs from major acquisitions like SRS and GMS
while still trying to defend margins and maintain its dividend.
Fresh news since the earnings miss
- Instacart partnership expands same‑day delivery in Canada
On December 2, 2025, Instacart and Home Depot Canada announced a nationwide partnership that brings same‑day delivery from more than 175 Home Depot Canada stores through the Instacart marketplace.
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The tie‑up:
Extends Home Depot’s omnichannel reach at a critical time in the busy holiday project season.
Simply Wall St
Supports smaller, fast‑turn purchases (paint, hardware, seasonal items) that may offset weakness in big‑ticket remodeling projects.
This move complements Home Depot’s broader investment in digital tools, logistics and last‑mile capabilities, which many analysts see as key to maintaining market share.
Simply Wall St
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- Institutional investors add to HD
A new MarketBeat report dated December 6, 2025 highlights that Cresset Asset Management LLC raised its stake in Home Depot by 17.3% in Q2, to about 59,761 shares valued near $21.9 million.
MarketBeat
The same report notes:
Roughly 70.9% of HD shares are held by institutions, underscoring Home Depot’s status as a core blue‑chip holding in many portfolios.
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Home Depot has set FY 2025 EPS guidance around $14.48, while Wall Street consensus still expects about $15.13 in earnings for the current year.
MarketBeat
Heavy institutional ownership can cut both ways: it supports liquidity and long‑term sponsorship, but can also mean crowded positioning when sentiment turns.
- Jim Cramer and the rate‑cut “call option”
On December 6, Jim Cramer reiterated his view that Home Depot is among the most rate‑sensitive stocks in the market, arguing that a Federal Reserve rate cut “could turn things around real fast” for HD given its dependence on housing activity and big‑ticket projects.
Finviz
Cramer acknowledged that Q3 was a “tough” quarter but said his charitable trust added shares near the recent lows, framing the stock as a levered play on lower mortgage rates and a revival in home improvement spending.
Finviz
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Macro backdrop: housing, rates and why they matter to Home Depot
Home Depot’s business is tied tightly to the U.S. housing market and the cost of borrowing:
The U.S. housing turnover rate is at a multi‑decade low (~28 transactions per 1,000 homes), as owners with ultra‑low pandemic‑era mortgages stay put.
AP News
Analysts and housing economists expect modest relief in 2026: forecasts compiled by outlets like Barron’s point to slightly lower mortgage rates (around the mid‑6% range) and a small but meaningful uptick in existing home sales.
Barron’s
Futures markets and several major banks, including Bank of America, anticipate the Federal Reserve will cut rates again in December 2025, with additional easing possible in 2026 if inflation trends cooperate.
Reuters
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Reuters
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For HD, the investment thesis often boils down to timing:
Near term (next 6–12 months): housing turnover is still weak, and discretionary projects remain under pressure.
Medium term (2026+): lower rates and normalized housing activity could unlock pent‑up renovation demand, especially as the U.S. housing stock continues to age.
Barron’s
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If that cyclical recovery arrives while Home Depot is integrating SRS and GMS and expanding its pro‑customer ecosystem, earnings leverage could be significant. If not, investors may be left holding an expensive defensive stock with slowing growth.
What Wall Street thinks: HD stock forecasts into 2026
Despite the recent stumble, most equity analysts remain constructive on Home Depot stock.
Consensus ratings
TipRanks:
Rating: “Moderate Buy” based on 24 analyst opinions over the last three months.
Breakdown: 18 Buy, 5 Hold, 1 Sell.
TipRanks
MarketBeat:
Rating: “Moderate Buy” with 21 Buy, 11 Hold and 2 Sell ratings currently in force.
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12‑month price targets
TipRanks average target: $409 (high $497, low $320), implying ~14% upside vs. recent prices around the mid‑$350s.
TipRanks
MarketBeat consensus target: about $403.50, suggesting roughly 13–14% upside.
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Recent notes collected by Benzinga show a cluster of major brokerages — including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Mizuho, Morgan Stanley, and Baird — trimming but mostly maintaining “overweight” or “outperform” ratings with targets generally between the low $400s and mid‑$450s, and one outlier at $497.
Benzinga
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In plain language: Wall Street still likes Home Depot, but with tempered expectations and an acceptance that 2025 earnings will decline before any potential 2026 rebound.
Technical picture and algorithmic forecasts for HD stock
From a technical and quant‑driven standpoint, the signals around HD are more cautious than the fundamental analyst consensus suggests.
Data compiled by CoinCodex on December 6 shows:
CoinCodex
Current price: $354.61
50‑day simple moving average: ~$375
200‑day simple moving average: ~$376
14‑day RSI: around 48, a neutral reading
Technical sentiment: flagged as “bearish”, with more indicators pointing down than up
Fear & Greed Index: 39 (Fear)
Because the stock trades below both its 50‑ and 200‑day moving averages, technicians would describe HD as being in a short‑term downtrend.
CoinCodex’s algorithmic price model (which uses only price and volume data, not fundamentals) currently projects:
CoinCodex
1‑month forecast: around $348, roughly ‑2% from current levels.
1‑year forecast: around $282, implying a potential decline of more than 20%.
2030 forecast: in a wide range roughly centered in the mid‑$200s, below today’s price.
These machine‑driven forecasts should not be treated as destiny. They mainly reflect recent price weakness and the stock’s position below key moving averages — but they do underline the risk that valuation could compress further if earnings disappoint again.
Valuation: quality at a price
Relative to peers and history, Home Depot’s valuation today looks full but not extreme:
P/E: about 24x trailing and 23x forward, slightly above its long‑term average and higher than the broader specialty retail group (around 18x).
StockAnalysis
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Simply Wall St
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PEG ratio: above 3.8 on some platforms, reflecting modest expected growth relative to price.
Yahoo Finance
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DCF fair‑value estimates around $301 suggest shares trade 15–20% above some conservative intrinsic value models.
Simply Wall St
On the positive side:
Return on equity remains extraordinary — above 160% in recent quarters — helped by leverage and share count discipline.
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Free cash flow is strong enough to support the 2.6% dividend yield and ongoing reinvestment.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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StockAnalysis
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The trade‑off is straightforward: investors buying HD today are paying up for stability, scale and a long dividend track record, even as near‑term earnings decline.
Bull vs. bear case for Home Depot stock into 2026
Bullish arguments
Structural housing tailwinds
The U.S. housing stock is old and getting older; deferred maintenance can only be delayed so long. When rates fall and mobility improves, repair and remodel demand should re‑accelerate.
Barron’s
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Scale and pro‑customer ecosystem
Acquisitions like SRS and GMS plus expanded delivery options (including Instacart in Canada) strengthen Home Depot’s position with professional contractors and serious DIYers.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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Omnichannel and supply‑chain investments
The company continues to invest heavily in distribution centers, AI‑driven logistics and in‑store digital tools, which should support higher margins and market share over time.
Simply Wall St
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Strong balance of cash flow and dividends
While leverage is meaningful, cash generation is robust, and the dividend profile is attractive for income‑oriented investors.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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StockAnalysis
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Analyst and institutional support
Most analysts rate the stock a buy or outperform, and institutions own over 70% of the float.
StockAnalysis
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TipRanks
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Bearish arguments
Near‑term earnings downtrend
Management itself is guiding to a mid‑single‑digit EPS decline in 2025, and Q3 marked multiple consecutive profit misses.
AP News
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The Home Depot
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Investing.com
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Valuation risk
Trading above some fair‑value estimates and peer multiples, HD may see multiple compression if growth remains muted or if rate cuts disappoint.
Simply Wall St
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StockAnalysis
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Macroeconomic sensitivity
A deeper economic slowdown, renewed inflation, or delays in Fed easing could keep housing turnover depressed longer than the market currently expects.
Reuters
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Morningstar
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Integration and execution risk
Folding in SRS and GMS while navigating tariffs, wage pressure and evolving consumer behavior adds complexity and potential margin volatility.
Home Depot Investor Relations
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Simply Wall St
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High leverage and premium expectations
Debt‑to‑equity ratios are elevated, and investors are still paying a premium multiple for what is, at least for now, shrinking earnings.
StockAnalysis
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Home Depot Investor Relations
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So is Home Depot stock a buy, hold, or wait‑and‑see?
Putting it all together:
Fundamentals: Home Depot remains a dominant, highly profitable retailer with strong cash flow and a well‑defended market position.
Cycle: The business is in the down part of its housing‑driven cycle, with EPS falling and comps barely positive.
Valuation: The stock trades at a solid premium to many retailers and to some intrinsic value models, but at a discount to recent analyst targets that imply mid‑teens upside over 12 months.
TipRanks
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MarketBeat
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Sentiment and technicals: Short‑term signals lean cautious to bearish, and algorithmic models see a risk of further downside if the current trend persists.
CoinCodex
For long‑term investors who:
Believe in a 2026–2027 housing recovery,
Are comfortable with cyclical swings, and
Want exposure to a blue‑chip dividend payer,
Home Depot can still make sense as part of a diversified portfolio — provided you accept that near‑term volatility and further downside are possible.
For more valuation‑sensitive or short‑term traders, waiting for either:
A clearer turn in housing and rate data, or
A more attractive entry point (lower price or higher earnings visibility)
may be the more prudent approach.
Either way, HD is likely to remain one of the key stocks to watch as the Fed’s next moves and the 2026 housing outlook come into focus.
Note: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Always do your own research or consult a licensed financial adviser before making investment decisions.
