Costco to hike membership fees; shares jump

Investing.com -- Costco jumped in afterhours trading Wednesday after the big box retailer said it would hike its annual membership fees starting this fall.

Costco Wholesale Corp (NASDAQ: COST) was up more than 4% in recent afterhours trading.

Costco plans to increase annual membership fees by $5 for U.S. and Canada Gold Star, Business, and Business add-on members starting Sept. 1, taking the annual fee to $65.

Annual fees for executive membership tier in the U.S. and Canada, making up a little over half of the 52 memberships, will increase by $10 to $130, which includes a primary membership fee of $65, plus the executive upgrade of $65, while the the maximum annual 2% reward associated with the executive membership will increase to $1,250 from $1,000, the company said.

The fee increases will impact around 52 million memberships.

The news come just months after the company on its recent earnings call signaled it had no clear plans to membership raise its fees this year.