Investors Buying Retail Stocks As Macy's Strong Q3 Report Spurs Optimism; Heads Up For Kohl's, Wal-Mart Results On Thursday

Retail stocks are the top performing sector Wednesday morning as strong quarterly figures from Macy's (NYSE: M) are given investors some hope heading into the holiday shopping season. The SPDR S&P Retail ETF (NYSE: XRT) is up more than 0.6 percent at last check; the S&P 500 -- for some comparison -- is down about a tenth of a percent.Traders in the sector have bid up shares of Macy's by more than 9 percent this morning. The company reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings of $0.47 per share on sales of $6.28 billion. Analysts on Macy's were looking for just $0.39 in profit per share on sales of around $6.2 billion. The department store retailer reaffirmed guidance with the quarterly report.The move higher in Macy's shares has added more than $1.5 billion to the company's market value.Elsewhere in the retail sector, shares of Target (NYSE: TGT) are trading up 1.4 percent, shares of Nordstrom (NYSE: JWN) are up 2.3 percent, and JC Penney (NYSE: JCP) shares are up 1.6 percent. Dillard's (NYSE: DDS) have surged more than 4 percent on the strong results; Bon-Ton (NASDAQ: BONT) shares are up 6.3 percent at last check. Amid the sector strength, shares of apparel company Perry Ellis (NASDAQ: PERY) have plunged more than 20 percent following a warning. The company is now looking for FY14 EPS in the range of $0.95 to $1.01, down very sharply from prior guidance of $1.50 to $1.60. Perry Ellis is now expecting a third quarter loss in the range of $0.15 to $0.17 per share, compared to the current Wall Street analyst consensus estimate of $0.13.Retail investors Wednesday are positioning themselves ahead of quarterly figures from Kohl's (NYSE: KSS) and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) on Thursday morning. Tune in to the premium Benzinga's Pro feed and/or calendar suite to get all the real-time updates as these numbers are released.