Why There Is Even More Upside for Walmart (and for Amazon Too)

September 5, 2018 by Jon C. Ogg

In a world that has become dominated by Amazon, it seems that no retailing company could compete. It turns out that many retailers can compete against Jeff Bezos. Walmart Inc. (NYSE: WMT) is the world’s largest retailer by most counts, and it is competing with Amazon and just about everyone else.

Walmart was given some fresh attention on Wednesday after Barclay’s has resumed coverage of the retail giant with an Overweight rating. The firm’s Karen Short also assigned a $110 price target on Walmart’s shares.

There are many continued growth drivers ahead for Walmart. Its most recent earnings report sent Walmart’s stock up and away. Its shares popped up to roughly $100 from $90 in that post-earnings reaction, but even with Wednesday’s gains, the shares have pulled back from the post-earnings highs.

It turns out that Barclay’s sees multiple levers that can drive the company’s earnings growth ahead. One of the drivers is the company’s multi-year transformation being considered in its third phase. Sustained comparable same-store sales growth, higher store traffic, and higher average tickets per customer are also all considered would-be wins for Walmart.

Despite Walmart shares being up over 1% at $96.50 late on Wednesday, Walmart remains stubbornly lower than its 52-week and all-time high. Walmart’s shares have traded hands as high as $109.98 over the last year, and Walmart’s current dividend (it is among the companies hiking its dividend for 40 years or more) is just above 2.1% at this time.

Barclay’s is considered to be above average in its views on Walmart. It turns out that the consensus analyst target price from Thomson Reuters is up at $104.00.

Walmart’s market capitalization is also about $285 billion at the current share price. That market cap and share price generate common multiples for investors that look and feel quite cheap for an industry leader and for a company that is on the upswing. It has a P/E ratio of just under 20 for the current year, and it’s valued at only 0.55-times its expected $515 billion in expected current year revenues.

Analysts have been raising their price target expectations on Amazon.com in recent days as well. That was as Amazon joined the $1 trillion market cap club.

D.A. Davidson reiterated its Buy rating on Amazon and raised its target to $2450 from $2200. Morgan Stanley recently reiterated its Overweight rating on Amazon and raised its target to $2500 from $1850.

Maybe this is one of those instances where investors can still win in either company. That has at least been the view of Wall Street analysts in their most recent calls.

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