Best Buy Raises Outlook on Strong Sales

A growing appetite for flat-screen TVs led Best Buy Co. to boost its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings outlook, sending its shares up 8.5%.

The nation’s largest consumer electronics chain also credited strong gift-card spending and tighter expense controls for raising the range of its earnings expectations.

For the quarter ending Feb. 25, Best Buy projected earnings from continuing operations of $1.25 to $1.30 a share, versus its previous view, which called for earnings at the high end of a $1.06 to $1.16 a share range. For fiscal 2006, Best Buy forecast earnings from continuing operations of $2.24 to $2.29 a share.

Best Buy shares rose $4.13 to $52.96.