Walmart third quarter demonstrated the company’s success in online sales and expansion of services pickup and delivery. Sales holiday quarter though and will be limited traffic due to the pandemic will grow due to extended in time savings.
On Tuesday before the market opens the largest supermarket chain in the U.S. Wal-Mart (WMT) reported its results for the third quarter of fiscal 2021, which ended October 31.
Walmart reported 16% growth in earnings per share (compared value) to the $1.34, which is 0.16 more than the average analyst estimate of $1,18.
The sum of the quarterly earnings grew to $5.14 billion compared to $3,29 billion a year earlier.
Total revenue rose 5% to $134,7 billion, also above analytical estimates of $132,23 billion Statistics quarterly revenues and profits Walmart for the last 2 years available here.
Walmart sales in the US increased by 6.4% in the key categories, including General goods and food.
Walmart digital sales again grew strongly by 79% after record jump of 97% in the second quarter.
The company said about the high rates of services pickup and delivery service Walmart. At the end of the quarter, Walmart has offered the online service for the pickup of products in 3600 locations and the delivery on the same day at approximately 2900 stores. Walmart operates more than 4700 stores in USA.
The company celebrated the launch of the subscription service Walmart +, putting such benefits as: unlimited, free shipping, access Scan & Go stores and discounts on fuel, but did not specify how many participants have signed up.
Marketinfo.pro wrote more about the service in the article “subscription Service Walmart + starts on September 15 and is cheaper than Amazon Prime subscription“.
Walmart announced that it is extra costs due to pandemic COVID-19 amounted to about $600 million, it included higher costs of labour and maintenance of cleanliness in the shops and other facilities. At the same time, it is less than $1.5 billion of such costs in the second quarter.
Statements of Walmart’s management.
Walmart financial officer Brett Biggs noted that the pandemic significantly accelerated the company’s transition to digital sales channels.
CEO Doug Mcmillon said the company expects the popularity of online shopping will not disappear: “We think this new behavior of customers will largely remain, and we have good opportunities to serve customers with the value and experience they are looking for.”
Guide Walmart warned investors that due to the rising cases of coronavirus in hospitals across the country, the company will resume restrict traffic in their stores starting this Saturday.
However, sales in the holiday quarter should be strong, since the retailer started early on holiday sales and have expanded the sale of “Black Friday” in time and on the online event to the shops not the large number of buyers simultaneously, and the service delivery was not overloaded. Such an approach should benefit both buyers and Walmart.
Walmart’s shares have grown by 28.27% since the beginning of the year at the close of trading on Monday.
