Walmart's share price soars due to strong revenue gains

Walmart's share price soared on Thursday as investors focused on the retail giant's strong quarterly revenue gains and shrugged off a net loss linked to the sale of a majority stake in its Brazilian unit.

The Bentonville, Arkansas-based company posted a net loss of $861 million for the three months ended July 31, 2018, compared with net income of $2.9 billion for the same quarter of 2017, Efe reported.

The net loss was a direct consequence of the company's sale of its majority stake in Walmart Brasil, a transaction for which the retailer recorded a $4.8 billion pre-tax loss.

But investors focused much more on the company's total revenues between May and July of $128 billion, which were up from $123.4 billion in the same quarter of 2017 and higher than Wall Street's expectations.

Walmart has begun reaping the benefits of a renewed focus on grocery sales in recent months and also has seen strong e-commerce sales growth since redesigning its Web site in a bid to compete with Amazon.

"Thanks to the hard work of our associates, we had a great quarter with strong results and momentum across the business. We're pleased with how customers are responding to the way we're leveraging stores and e-commerce to make shopping faster and more convenient," Walmart President & CEO Doug McMillon was quoted as saying in a company press release.

Walmart's share price was up by more than 10 percent shortly after 12.30 pm at $99.52 a share, making it by far the biggest gainer Thursday among the Dow 30.

--IANS

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