Market Mad House

In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. Friedrich Nietzsche

Walmart (NYSE: WMT)

Grocery Wars

Will Walmart beat Amazon at E-Commerce?

Americans downloaded Walmart’s App 113,000 times during the 2019 Black Friday shopping frenzy, Sensor Tower reports. That was a 23% increase over 2018.

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Cryptocurrency

What Value Could a Walmart Cryptocurrency Have?

I think stablecoins are a more advanced payment mechanism rather than a true cryptocurrency. Therefore, I think Walmart is trying to develop a better payment application for fiat currency rather than an altcoin.

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Grocery Wars

Will Artificial Intelligence and Robots Pay Off for Walmart?

“The focus will be on learning from the technology and not implementing changes to operations in haste,” Walmart writes of the IRL. Thus, Walmart is committing to AI for the long-haul.

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Grocery Wars

Walmart Lives but is it Making Money?

Walmart lives is the message the latest financial numbers scream at us. For instance, Walmart (NYSE: WMT) reports a gross

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The Death Spiral

Will Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) Die this Holiday Season?

The situation is not that bleak for Abercrombie & Fitch because of the clothing market’s decentralized nature. To clarify, there is more than enough market share for Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) to survive.

Notably, Amazon Prime had 95 million subscribers in June 2018 up from 85 million in June 2017, Statista calculates. Thus, Amazon Prime is the fastest growing and most important retail outlet in America.

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Grocery Wars

Is Amazon Pay coming to Brick and Mortar Stores?

QR code has other advantages including the ability to work with almost any phone with a camera. Moreover, Walmart (NYSE: WMT) accepts QR code apps but not NFC. Hence, Walmart could accept Amazon Pay but not Apple Pay or Google Pay.
Additionally, Walmart offers its own QR code wallet called Walmart Pay. Markedly The Journal did not say if they will integrate Walmart Pay with Amazon Pay.

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Market Insanity

Bernie Sanders wants a $15-an Hour Wage at Walmart

The $15 an hour minimum wage could have killed 20,000 temporary jobs at Amazon.

To clarify, Quartz estimates Amazon will hire 100,000 temps for holiday season 2018. In contrast Amazon hired 120,000 temporary workers for holiday seasons in 2016 and 2018.

Amazon no longer needs the 20,000 temps because of its deployment of Kiva robots in fulfillment centers, Citi analyst Mark May theorizes. In particular, Kiva robots eliminate workers who pull merchandise from the shelves.

Instead, the robots literally bring the shelves to the workers who pull and pack and the goods for shipment. Quartz claims, Amazon cut the time needed to pull and pack an order from an hour to 15 minutes with robots.

To be fair to Bernie, Amazon would have deployed the robots with or without the $15 wage. In fact, the robots could have made the $15 wage possible by reducing the size of the labor force. Amazon is paying workers more because it has fewer of them thanks to robots.

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Grocery Wars

Amazon (AMZN) owns Retail, can Anybody Compete?

It should scare brick and mortar retailers because Amazon Go could generate profits similar to Amazon itself.

For instance, Amazon Go could generate up $2,700 a square foot in annual sales per square foot, Brick meets Click, claims. In contrast, Costar estimated Walmart’s annual sales-per-square foot was $325 in 2018.

Thus Amazon Go’s sales per square foot could be seven times those of Walmart’s. However, the Apple Store’s sales per square foot were nearly twice Amazon Go’s at $5,546 in 2017.

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Long Ideas

Will Microsoft (MSFT) Make Money from GitHub?

In addition, Microsoft can offer next generation solutions such as Linux, the blockchain, cryptocurrencies, Ethereum, the internet of things (IoT), sidechains, and memached servers through GitHub. Another lucrative use of GitHub is joint ventures.

For example, Microsoft and Walmart (NYSE: WMT) are entering into a five-year strategic cloud partnership called 4.co. In 4.co engineers from both companies will develop internal apps utilizing Microsoft Azure and migrate Walmart operations the cloud, VentureBeat reports.

The 4.co team can leverage GitHub by using it to hire developers and make money by selling apps through GitHub. Moreover, the 4.co could greatly increase its brainpower and expertise with GitHub developers.

Planned 4.co projects that could leverage GitHub include internal chatbots, food-spoilage tracking, sensors, and improvements to Microsoft’s register-less ordering. The 4.co team will operate out of an office in Austin, Texas.

Thus GitHub is worth the risks for Microsoft. In particular, GitHub greatly increases Microsoft’s R&D capabilities without massive investments in new facilities or people

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Grocery Wars

Walmart approaches $500 Billion in Revenue

Obviously, Walmart and not Amazon is the world’s largest and richest retailer. More importantly, Amazon will not approach Walmart’s revenues soon.

Therefore, Walmart can sink money into its online operations; automated stores, and new technology. As a result Walmart will probably be able to keep up with Amazon; and possibly block its entry into some markets.

The moral of the store is do not count Walmart out. The world’s largest retailer has the resources to maintain its dominance for decades to come despite Amazon’s explosive growth.

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