Sears Holding’s revenue fell to $8.5 billion for the quarter that ended May 4, 2013, as compared to revenue of $9.3 billion for the comparable quarter a year ago. Same-store sales in the United States dropped 3.6%. This drop was made up of a fall of 4.6% at Kmart and 2.4% at Sears Domestic. The company lost $279 million, compared to a profit of $189 million a year ago.

Hedge fund manager Eddie Lampert, Sears Holdings’ chairman and chief executive officer, promised the company will try to better “communicate” with its customers and use technology to better match inventory with customer demand. Those will not matter much if potential customers do visit its stores.

A year ago, AP reported a comment about Sears from a retail expert. It mirrors what many analysts have said about the company, which is also the anxiety of many investors:

“The image is atrocious. The stores are old and they’re run down. They don’t look like a nice place to visit,” Ron Friedman, a partner in the retail and consumer products industry group of accounting firm Marcum, LLP said. “I don’t think that the Sears we see today can be around from a year today. It has to change.”

Companies that have significant profits, access to capital and strong balance sheets have continued to upgrade stores. This includes Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT), Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT) and Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M). These companies assume that modern stores are as likely as not to attract shoppers. If their financial results are an indication, this assumption may be right.

Lampert indicated in the comments he made about the most recent quarter that Sears needs to raise more money. That means it is unlikely the company has the capital to make a companywide upgrade of its locations. But without such a transformation, “old and run-down” stores will bedevil the chance for a turnaround.

The balance of the top ten on the list has the usual suspects, at least among America’s super rich. At $59.2 billion, Warren Buffett sits in third place. Filthy rich conservative brothers Charles and David Koch have $55.2 billion. Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) founder and America Cup patron Larry Ellison has a $41.6 billion net worth. And Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) founder Sam Walton’s children Christy and Jim have $36.1 billion.

When the Forbes list comes out, the Bloomberg one will be forgotten — at least for a day.

However, buried in the earnings release was good news about e-commerce. Walmart’s online sales rose more than 30%. In its most recently reported quarter, e-commerce giant Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) boasted its revenue was up 22% to $16.1 billion. Based on those statistics, Walmart has become a force to be reckoned with in online retail sales.

Walmart’s e-commerce revenue is only 10% of the company’s total. However, that puts the number at more than $40 billion. Obviously, Walmart’s disadvantage is that it owns stores, a problem that is impossible to underestimate as it tries to crawl out of a period of flat revenue.

Walmart does have several critical advantages in its online business. The first is clearly brand recognition. Amazon may be universally known as the e-commerce leader, but Walmart’s brand is as visible as nearly any in the United States, and to some extent overseas.

Walmart also has the second largest online web property in the United States, according to research firm Comscore. Walmart sites had 41 million unique visitors in March. Amazon had 121.4 million. The gulf is tremendous, but Walmart has some means to close it, at least when the spotlight returns to the advantage of its huge overall revenue.

Walmart has begun to do some things that should increase online sales impressively, some of which leverage its store base. Buyers can order online and pick up merchandise at stores. Amazon cannot nearly match that. Walmart also has moved toward same-day delivery of goods ordered online. Amazon has started to do the same. Walmart may not be ahead in this critical race, but is not behind.

Many analysts believe that Amazon’s real advantage has been the creation of its Kindle line. The tablets range from e-readers to modestly powered PCs. The electronics help Amazon boost online sales, particularly of digital media products. Walmart cannot match the Kindle program. It might however, form a strategic alliance with another maker of tablets. Troubled Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) comes to mind.

Walmart may be behind Amazon in e-commerce. That does not mean the world’s largest retailer cannot make substantial gains.

For those who do not have to travel by air this summer — don’t. The number of seats filled will hit near-record levels. Airports will be crowed, in many cases where temperatures are high. The lines will be longer. And flight delays will be more likely than at any time in memory. According to trade group Airlines for America, the economic recovery has helped the airline industry, but:

… more people will fly this summer than a year ago, and a record number of passengers will fly internationally. A4A said it expects U.S. airlines will carry close to 209 million passengers globally from June through August, an increase of 1 percent from the same period in 2012. The system-wide summer estimate includes 27 million international passengers, a record number for U.S. airlines.

This marks the largest summer volume for U.S. airlines since 2008, when more than 210 million traveled. The all-time high was summer 2007, when more than 217 million people took to the skies on U.S. airlines.  A4A further noted that the busiest travel days are expected to be Thursdays and Fridays between the middle of June and the first week of August.

Bloomberg Billionaires Shuffle

In the battle of the billionaire lists, Forbes has held the high ground for years. Now, Bloomberg Billionaires has taken a prominent spot in media coverage. That was boosted yesterday when the disgraced news service announced that Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) founder Bill Gates had moved ahead of Mexican telecom giant Carlos Slim. The net worth of Gates is at $72.7 billion, and for Slim it is $72.1 billion. Since the Bloomberg Billionaires list changes daily, Gates may not hold his position for long. The balance of the top ten on the list has the usual suspects, at least among America’s super rich. At $59.2 billion, Warren Buffett sits in third place. Filthy rich conservative brothers Charles and David Koch have $55.2 billion. Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) founder and America Cup patron Larry Ellison has a $41.6 billion net worth. And Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) founder Sam Walton’s children Christy and Jim have $36.1 billion. When the Forbes list comes out, the Bloomberg one will be forgotten — at least for a day.

European Auto Sales

The European Automobile Manufacturers Association reported that regionwide car sales rose for the first time in a year and a half:

In April, the EU market of new passenger cars grew for the first time (+1.7%) since September 2011. The region counted on average two more working days compared to the same month last year, which would account for the increase. In absolute figures, it is the third lowest level of new registrations for a month of April, with the historic low for April reached in 2012 (1,021,358 units). A total of 1,038,343 units was recorded in the EU in April this year, or 1.7% more compared to the low level of April last year.

The region’s economic superpower helped:

In April, results were varied across markets. Looking at the major ones, Germany (+3.8%), Spain (+10.8%) and the UK (+14.8%) expanded, while France (-5.3%) and Italy (-10.8%) faced a downturn.

The dog of the region continued to be General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM), which loses hundreds of millions of dollars in Europe each quarter. Sales of its models dropped 4.5% in April to 79,686. Its major rival, Volkswagen, had a good month. Sales rose 9.9% to 274,925.

Foxconn, once one of Apple Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) largest suppliers, says it needs additional time to cut back worker overtime. (Reuters)

Dell Inc.’s (NASDAQ: DELL) profits fall, but that may not stop the fight over its future ownership. (Reuters)

Samsung runs out of some key parts for its smartphones and may have to turn to competitors for more inventory. (Reuters)

J.C. Penney Co. Inc.’s (NYSE: JCP) new CEO says it will take several quarters to salvage the company. (Reuters)

Dish Network Corp. (NASDAQ: DISH) will press the FCC to look at the Softbank bid for Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S). (Reuters)

EBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) could create apps for Google Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Glass product. (Reuters)

Northrup Grumman Corp. (NYSE: NOC) will try to buy back 25% of its shares by 2015. (Reuters)

The Securities and Exchange Commission to charge Nasdaq OMX Group Inc. (NASDAQ: NDAQ) with a record fine for failing to keep track of trouble in its own markets. (WSJ)

The stock market is not hurt by an earnings season with many poor results. (WSJ)

Shareholders of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) are sent a letter supporting Jamie Dimon’s attempt to remain as both chief executive officer and chairman. (WSJ)

Wages in China rise sharply in the past year. (WSJ)

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) says that consumers are “stretched” due to an uneven economy. (WSJ)

A new way to account for leases may increase the amount of debt some companies carry on their balance sheets. (WSJ)

Google says several companies, including CNN, Twitter and Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB), have made apps for Google Glass. (NYT)

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) traders will not longer use the chat feature on Bloomberg terminals as the scandal over journalist access to data grows. (FT)

U.S. farm land prices grow sharply despite weak demand for wheat. (FT)

Monthly car sales in Europe rise for the first time in 19 months, mostly on strength in Germany. (Bloomberg)

The U.S. dollar index is trading down 0.28% today, now at 83.5980. The GSCI commodity index is down 0.1% at 624.91. WTI crude oil closed up 0.9%, at $95.16 a barrel. Brent crude trades up 0.2% at $103.93 a barrel. Natural gas is down 3.3% today at about $3.94 per million BTUs following a larger-than-expected addition to U.S. inventories<<LINK>>. Gold settled down 0.7% today at $1,386.90.

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA down more than 42 points to 15,233.22 (-0.28%), the NASDAQ fell more than 6 points (-0.18%) to 3,465.24, and the S&P 500 fell 0.50% or more than 8 points to 1,650.47.

There were a several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including:

• Barrick Gold Corp (NYSE: ABX) was cut to ‘underperform’ at Macquarie;
• Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) cut to ‘neutral’ with a $20 price target at J.P. Morgan;
• Constellation Brands Inc. (NYSE: STZ) raised to ‘buy’ with a price target of $64 at Stifel Nicolaus;
• Palo Alto Networks Inc. (NYSE: PANW) raised to ‘overweight’ with a price target of $65 at Morgan Stanley; and
• SunPower Corp. (NASDAQ: SPWR) raised to ‘outperform’ at Cowen Securities.

Earnings reports since markets closed last night have resulted in some price changes for reporting companies as of the last half hour of trading today:

• Dillard’s Inc. (NYSE: DDS) is up 2.6% at $91.36 after posting a new 52-week high of $92.93 earlier today;
• Jack in the Box Inc. (NASDAQ: JACK) is down 4.1% at $36.78;
• Skechers USA Inc. (NYSE: SKX) is down 3.6% at $20.64;
• E Commerce China Dangdang Inc. (NYSE: DANG) is up 5.3% at $5.20;
• Kohl’s Corp. (NYSE: KSS) is up 4.6% at $51.97;
• ReneSola Ltd. (NYSE: SOL) is down 14.5% at $1.89; and
• Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) is down 2.1% at $78.21.

Before markets open tomorrow morning we are scheduled to hear earnings from Autodesk Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK), Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL), J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP), Nordstrom Inc. (NYSE: JWN), and Stage Stores Inc. (NYSE: SSI).

Some standouts among heavily traded stocks today include:

Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is up 13.1% at $23.98, after posting a new 52-week high of $24.24 earlier today. The networking equipment giant posted strong earnings last night.

National Bank of Greece SA (NYSE: NBG) is up 20.1% at $2.03. The Greek bank’s shares have risen by a third since the country’s sovereign debt rating was upgraded earlier this week.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD) is down 13.4% at $3.80. The chipmaker’s shares took a beating today after Goldman said that the stock was overpriced.

Stay tuned for Friday. Minneapolis Fed President Narayana Kocherlakota is giving a speech. We have (also) noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 9:55 a.m. – University of Michigan/Thomson Reuters consumer sentiment index
• 10:00 a.m. – Leading indicators

Net sales grew 1.1% year-over-year, while the store’s memberships and other income rose 1.6%. Consolidated net income rose 1.1% to $3.8 billion. The best thing to say about any of these numbers is that they could have been worse.

Walmart guided second-quarter EPS in a range of $1.22 to $1.27, well below the consensus estimate of $1.29. The company said that investments in global e-commerce will clip $0.09 a share from Walmart’s full-year EPS and $0.02 a share from second-quarter earnings, which is equal to the impact on earnings in the first quarter. Online sales grew more than 30% year-over-year for the first quarter.

The company’s CEO said:

In a quarter marked by considerable headwinds to top line sales, Walmart delivered solid EPS growth of 4.6 percent. … Our expectations about our U.S. businesses’ performance, coupled with more discipline in International, will allow us to improve our performance throughout the year.

Walmart’s CFO noted that “the second quarter will be challenging, given expense pressures in International and in our corporate area.” Walmart has apparently decided that the best way for the company to improve sales and earnings is to cut expenses. It does not specifically say how it will do that, but a good guess would be cutting employees.

U.S. same-store sales for the quarter fell 1.2%, both including and excluding fuel sales. Customer traffic was down 1.8% although the average sales ticket rose 0.4%. For the second quarter, the company expects same-store sales to settle in the range of flat to up 2%.

Shares are down about 2.5% in premarket trading this morning, at $77.84 in a 52-week range of $58.95 to $79.96, and the high was posted yesterday. Thomson Reuters had a consensus analyst price target of around $80.60 before today’s results were announced.

The new Buffett holdings are below.

American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP) was roughly 151.6 million shares, SAME AS last quarter.

Bank of New York Mellon Corp. (NYSE: BK) was almost 19 million shares, which appears to be slightly lower but it had been raised before. What matters here is that it remains a substantial holding still.

Chicago Bridge & Iron Co. (NYSE: CBI) was a NEW POSITION at just over 6.5 million shares worth over $400 million.

Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO) was more than 400 million shares due to the stock split of 2012, but this is virtually the SAME AS BEFORE.

ConocoPhillips (NYSE: COP) is the SAME POSITION at 24.1 million shares, but this is lower than in prior quarters.

Costco Wholesale Corp. (NASDAQ: COST) was the SAME POSITION at 4,333,363 shares.

DaVita Inc. (NYSE: DVA) was a LARGER POSITION and already more than a 10% stake and we recently saw that Berkshire Hathaway had entered into a standstill agreement not to buy more than 25% of the company after already having increased its stake recently. This was listed as 14.97 million shares as of March 31 versus 13.6 million shares before.

Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE) was the SAME POSITION at roughly 4 million shares.

DirecTV (NASDAQ: DTV) was HIGHER YET AGAIN at 37.275 million shares versus almost 34 million shares and that was also higher than before.

Gannett Co. (NYSE: GCI) was the SAME POSITION of 1.74 million shares.

General Electric Corp. (NYSE: GE) is listed as the SAME POSITION at 588,900 shares, but this is still way down from prior reports.

General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) is the SAME POSITION at 25 million shares, but this was previously up from smaller positions.

GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE: GSK) is the SAME POSITION at 1.51 million shares.

The U.S. dollar index is trading up 0.29% today, now at 83.8370. The GSCI commodity index is down 0.4% at 627.87. WTI crude oil closed up 0.1%, at $94.30 a barrel following the release of the EIA’s inventory data. Brent crude trades 1.1% at $103.72 a barrel. Natural gas is up 1% today at about $4.06 per million BTUs. Gold settled down 2% today at $1,396.20.

The unofficial closing bells put the DJIA up about 60 points to 15,275.15 (0.39%), the NASDAQ rose about 9 points (0.26%) to 3,471.62, and the S&P 500 rose 0.51% or more than 8 points to 1,658.71.

There were a several analyst upgrades and downgrades today, including:

• Golar LNG Ltd. (NASDAQ: GLNG) cut to ‘sell’ at Goldman Sachs;
• BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY) cut to ‘market perform’ at Bernstein;
• Lowe’s Companies Inc. (NYSE: LOW) reiterated as ‘buy’ and price target raised to $48 at Argus;
• Gap Inc. (NYSE: GPS) raised to ‘buy’ at Citigroup; and
• Charles Schwab Corp. (NYSE: SCHW) cut to ‘underweight’ at Barclays.

Earnings reports since markets closed last night have resulted in some price changes for reporting companies as of the last half hour of trading today:

• Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) is up 3.7% at $45.60 after posting a new 52-week high of $46.49 earlier today;
• Primo Water Corp. (NASDAQ: PRMW) is down 7.2% at $1.42;
• Computer Sciences Corp. (NYSE: CSCO) is down 9.9% at $44.61;
• Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE) is down 4.6% at $89.46;
• First Majestic Silver Corp. (NYSE: AG) is down 9.8% at $10.15 after posting a new 52-week low of $10.13 earlier today; and
• Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M) is up 2.7% at $48.66 after posting a new 52-week high of $48.91 earlier today.

Before markets open tomorrow morning we are scheduled to hear earnings from Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO), Dillard’s Inc. (NYSE: DDS), Jack in the Box Inc. (NASDAQ: JACK), Skechers USA Inc. (NYSE: SKX), E Commerce China Dangdang Inc. (NASDAQ: DANG), Kohl’s Corp. (NYSE: KSS), ReneSola Ltd. (NYSE: SOL), and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT).

Some standouts among heavily traded stocks today include:

Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. (NYSE: BMY) is up 5.2% at $44.40, after posting a new 52-week high of $45.59 earlier today. The biopharmaceutical firm gave an upbeat presentation on its plans for new cancer and heart drugs.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is down 3.6% at $427.92. The PC and consumer electronics product maker is being sued by the U.S. Justice Department for leading a price-fixing scheme in the book publishing business.

Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA) is up 3.5% at $3.45. The social games producer got a big boost from a purchase of 25 million of the company’s shares by activist investor Jana Partners.

Stay tuned for Thursday. Philadelphia Fed President Charles Plosser, Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren, Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher, Fed Governor Sarah Bloom Raskin, and San Francisco Fed President John Williams are all giving speeches. We have also noted the following events on the schedule (all times Eastern):

• 8:30 a.m. – Consumer price index
• 8:30 a.m. – Housing starts
• 8:30 a.m. – New claims for unemployment benefits
• 10:00 a.m. – Philadelphia Fed survey
• 10:30 a.m. – EIA weekly natural gas storage report
• 4:30 p.m. – Fed balance sheet and money supply

Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) starts to deliver the 787 Dreamliner again. (Reuters)

Amazon.com Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AMZN) efforts to get companies to use its cloud computing service begins to use outside consultants to make the case to corporations. (Reuters)

HSBC Holdings PLC (NYSE: HBC) plans to cut another $2 billion to $3 billion in costs by 2016. (Reuters)

Sony Corp. (NYSE: SNE) and Sharp must contend with shareholder and bond holder concerns about their futures. (WSJ)

The U.S. deficit falls below Congressional Budget Office estimates because of tax receipts, lower federal costs and dividends from firms such as Fannie Mae. (WSJ)

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) will start to improve safety at its Bangladesh suppliers. (WSJ)

Votes from shareholders show that Jamie Dimon of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) is likely to hold both the chairman and CEO jobs. (WSJ)

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) will start a streaming music business. (WSJ)

Blackberry (NASDAQ: BBRY) targets emerging markets with its new phones. (WSJ)

T-Mobile US Inc. (NYSE: TMUS) raises the price of the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone 5. (WSJ)

Governor Jerry Brown claims California will have a $1.1 billion surplus this year. (WSJ)

Data from China prompt some economists to cut growth forecasts. (WSJ)

Lockheed Martin Corp. (NYSE: LMT) CEO Marillyn Hewson presses critics of the F-35, saying many of the development troubles have improved. (WSJ)

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) is expected to report lower-than-estimated profits. (WSJ)

The European Union is looking into charges that oil firms set published prices of crude. (WSJ)

Revenue growth at Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) drops sharply recently. (WSJ)

The Justice Department claims Apple was a central player in e-book price fixing. (NYT)

China’s corporate debt market could match that of the United States in size. (FT)

Large Japanese carriers ANA Holdings and Japan Airlines are in talks with Airbus about the A350. (Bloomberg)

HSBC may cut 14,000 jobs. (Bloomberg)