Walmart Stock Drops Following Exec. Email Leak

Walmart’s stock fell 2.2 percent to $69.30 on Friday following the release of internal emails obtained by Bloomberg News, one of which describes the mega-retailer’s February sales as a “total disaster.”

“In case you haven’t seen a sales report these days, February MTD sales are a total disaster,” Jerry Murray, Walmart’s VP of finance and logistics, wrote in an email dated Feb. 12 to fellow executives. “The worst start to a month I have seen in my seven years with the company.”

Murray’s comments came on the heels of an additional email, dated Feb. 1, in which Cameron Geiger, SVP of Wal-Mart U.S. Replenishment, bemoaned Walmart’s poor January sales.

“Have you ever had one of those weeks where your best-prepared plans weren’t good enough to accomplish everything you set out to do?” Geiger wrote. “Well, we just had one of those weeks here at Walmart U.S. Where are all the customers? And where’s their money?”

According to Bloomberg, both executives attributed Bentonville, Ark.-based Walmart’s drop in sales to consumers’ “increased payroll taxes and delayed tax returns.”

In response to these events, Walmart spokesman David Tovar said in an interview, “As with any organization, we often see internal communications that are not entirely accurate, that lack the proper context and represent individual opinions.”

Tovar added that Walmart will release its fourth-quarter earnings on Feb. 21, Bloomberg reported.
 

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