Wal-Mart boosts forecast on higher earnings; shares up

Wal-Mart’s chief executive officer, Doug McMillion also shared positive comments on the company’s quarterly release as he quoted: “We’re pleased with the positive momentum in our business”. During its last trading session, Stock traded with the total exchanged volume of 26.85 million shares. However, the picture in Canada was not quite so rosy with same-store sales growth slowing to 1.1 per cent in the second quarter against a 6.7 per cent first-quarter growth.

“We’ve got existing customers who are visiting stores more often and putting an extra item in their basket”, Greg Foran, CEO of Wal-Mart’s USA business told reporters on a call Thursday. The most recent short interest data show 1.96% of the company’s stock are short sold.

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.is engaged in the operation of retail, wholesale and other units in various formats around the world.

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.(NYSE:WMT) reached at $72.93 price level during last trade its distance from 20 days simple moving average is -0.23%, and its distance from 50 days simple moving average is 0.83% while it has a distance of 10.80% from the 200 days simple moving average.

As for the big investments in digital retail, it’s critical for Walmart to do so as it continues to play catchup with online commerce king Amazon.

Under the leadership of McMillon, Wal-Mart is taking aggressive steps to change its reputation as a retailer that’s focused only on price. It will incorporate some of Jet.com’s technology that lowers prices in real time by finding ways to cut costs. Total revenue of $120.854 billion was up 0.5% compared to the same quarter in 2015 and was better than the consensus estimate of $120.16 billion.

Sales at U.S. Wal-Mart stores open more than 12 months rose 1.6 percent last quarter, which ended July 31, the Bentonville, Arkansas-based company said in a statement Thursday. Earnings of $1.21 per share easily topped estimates of $1.02, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. The Estimize forecast calls for $120.39 billion in sales.

Wal-Mart (WMT +1.8%) has now put in two straight quarters of outperformance in the retail sector. While revenues increased on a year-over-year basis owing to an improvement in comps, earnings witnessed a decline.

For the full year 2017, Wal-Mart lifted its EPS outlook to a range of $4.15 to $4.35, up from a prior view of $4.00 to $4.30. Analysts had expected $4.27.

With the Jet.com acquisition, current Jet.com president and CEO Marc Lore will join Walmart as president and CEO of e-commerce, reporting to McMillon. Please see our terms of service for more information. For the protection of AP and its licensors, content may not be copied, altered or redistributed in any form.