Walmart's earnings disappoint, and it's pretty much all due to e-commerce

© Khunaspix Dreamstime.

Walmart stock was hammered in the aftermath of this week’s results which disappointed investors and analysts, and as this report from Freightwaves explains, much of that was due to lack of available inventory for e-commerce sales, which “harmed our basic in-stock on more everyday items and our basic in-stock for e-commerce suffered as a result. So we’re learning how to deal with higher volumes and learning how to deal with a higher peak than what we had previously”. But it’s a measure of how astounding the e-commerce market has become that Walmart’s “failure” was to only record a 23% increase in sales in the thrid quarter compared to a 50% increase in the same period the year before.