By Alexander Bueso
Date: Thursday 18 Feb 2021
LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Wal Mart's shares fell after the low-cost retailer's fourth quarter earnings fell short of expectations and the company guided lower for earnings over the year ahead.
The company posted a net loss of $2.09bn of -74 cents per share for the three months to 31 December, versus a prior year gain of $4.14bn or $1.45 per share.
On an adjusted basis the company's quarterly EPS printed at $1.39, but that remained well below the median projection from the consensus for $1.51.
Yet Wal Mart did grow its topline from $141.67bn to $152.08bn, comfortably beating the consensus estimate for $148.51bn.
Like-for-like sales were strong too, jumping by 8.6% (consensus: 5.6%), amid a 69% surge in online sales.
Part of the disparity between the company's performance on its top and bottom lines was accounted for by $1.1bn in COVId-related costs.
For the year ahead, Wal Mart guided towards a slight decline in earnings per share, although on a comparable basis, which excludes divestitures, the opposite was true, with EPS was seen flat-to-up slightly.
LFL sales meanwhile were seen increasing at a low single digits rate excluding fuel, against a consensus forecast for a dip of 0.1% and EPS of $5.75.
The board also approved a 2% increase in its annual dividend to $2.2 per share, alongside an authorisation for $20bn stock buyback plan.
As of 1354 GMT, shares of Wal Mart were falling 5.44% in premarket trading.
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Currency | US Dollars |
Share Price | $ 60.16 |
Change Today | $ -0.05 |
% Change | -0.08 % |
52 Week High | $175.86 |
52 Week Low | $58.61 |
Volume | 11,045,017 |
Shares Issued | 8,077m |
Market Cap | $485,912m |
RiskGrade | 117 |
Strong Buy | 14 |
Buy | 19 |
Neutral | 5 |
Sell | 0 |
Strong Sell | 0 |
Total | 38 |
Time | Volume / Share Price |
16:00 | 1,557,202 @ $60.16 |
15:59 | 2,000 @ $60.13 |
15:59 | 178 @ $60.12 |
15:59 | 100 @ $60.13 |
15:59 | 100 @ $60.13 |
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