Here's What Walmart Just Told Us About the Economy
Retail giant Walmart (NYSE: WMT) had a lot to say about the economy in Tuesday's earnings report. The management team used the words "inflation" and "inflationary" 39 times on the earnings call, ahead of popular terms such as "growth," "profit," and "prices." It's safe to say that economic pressure is affecting Walmart in many ways, and the inflation issue is a top priority right now.
Here are a few samples of Walmart's economic analysis from this week's earnings report and conference call. The themes these executives unearthed should be helpful for investors across the retail industry.
Walmart CEO Doug McMillon noted that prices are rising across a wide range of products, as you would expect in an era of red-hot inflation. The company is passing on its higher costs to consumers, resulting in massive changes to the product mix. The raw volume of food items being sold stayed stable in the second quarter, even though inflationary effects increased the cost per unit by double-digit percentages.
Source Fool.com
