Yahoo Finance Why Walmart's CEO isn't worried about the economy as the stock hits all-time highs
Walmart's CEO isn't too concerned about all the pressures on American shoppers.
"We actually don't worry that much about whether the economy grows 3%, 2%, [or] shrinks 1%," Walmart CEO Doug McMillon said at the Goldman Sachs Global Consumer Conference in New York City on Tuesday.
This comes as consumers' wallets remain pinched by stubborn inflation, higher gas prices, and resuming student loan repayments, among other headwinds that McMillon expects will be "about the same" in 2024.
"If people are more value-conscious, they come our way," he explained. "Even better, if they have more money, we'll drive more sales, so we have a bit of a hedge against that. And we're just focused on executing our plan and don't worry too much about what happens broadly with the consumer."
Investors don't seem too concerned either: Walmart stock closed at an all-time high of $164.51 per share on Tuesday.
The stock has slowly been gaining momentum this month. Shares of America's largest retailer are up about 16% year to date. That's higher than the Dow Jones Industrial Average's (^DJI) year-to-date gain of almost 5% and significantly outpaces Target stock (TGT), which is down more than 17%.
In the retail giant's second quarter results, Walmart posted same-store sales that rose 6.3%, more than the 4.04% expected, according to data from Bloomberg. Foot traffic also increased by 2.8% for Walmart along with a higher average ticket and online sales in the quarter.
Goldman Sachs analyst Kate McShane, who moderated the panel with CEO Doug McMillion, told Yahoo Finance she believes Walmart will continue to gain share in grocery and general merchandise.
"Walmart is speaking to a broader swath of the consumer," McShane said. "It's not just the lower-end consumer anymore, so with all their digital effort, they're much more like Amazon."
Walmart sees disinflation but higher prices still 'with us'
Notably, McMillon said Walmart is starting to see some signs of disinflation. But don't expect prices to drop significantly anytime soon.
"Inflation and higher prices are kind of with us," McMillon said. "We'll see disinflation but not all the way back to deflation. ... Certainly not in the short term."
When asked about disinflation on the grocery side, in particular, he said, "I think it'll be slow."
"We'd like for us to see the opportunity for customers to have more disinflation and have lower prices faster," McMillon added. "What we've seen over the last few years has resulted in dry grocery consumables having a pretty big two-year stack inflation number, and that's coming down a little bit but not a lot."
The latest inflation data is expected Wednesday morning. In July, grocery prices increased by 0.3% on a monthly basis, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' (BLS) Consumer Price Index (CPI). On a year-over-year basis, prices for food at home rose 3.6%, a slower rate than the month prior.
As far as general merchandise categories like apparel and home decor go, declines in inflation "look faster," McMillon said, but higher prices compared to two years ago are here to stay.
"In general merchandise, prices are lower than they were a year ago but not as low as they were two years ago," McMillon said. "I don't think that general merchandise gets all the way back down to two-year-ago prices."
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Brooke DiPalma is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter at @BrookeDiPalma or email her at bdipalma@yahoofinance.com.
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