Walmart’s Best Day of the Year

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Dec 1, 9:15AM EST

24/7 Wall St. Key Points

The latest Walmart Inc. (NYSE: WMT) earnings show it is still the dominant retailer in America despite some headwinds.
Black Friday sales estimates suggest that U.S. consumer sentiment is strong.

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Walmart’s Best Day of the Year — © walmartcorporate / Flickr

The latest Walmart Inc. (NYSE: WMT | WMT Price Prediction) earnings show it is still the dominant retailer in America. Based on revenue, it will remain ahead of Amazon as the nation’s largest company based on sales. What continued to worry the market about Walmart was macroeconomic factors. If consumer sentiment faltered, Walmart would not be able to overcome the headwinds. Because of its size, it is a proxy for the behavior of U.S. consumers.

The headwinds are real. Unemployment, although still fairly healthy, has crept up for months. Consumer sentiment has wobbled. Inflation has reached an inflection point because of tariffs. The holiday season might be undercut by consumer worry, many economists said. Recently, the Federal Reserve of Philadelphia reported that its Fourth Quarter 2025 Survey of Professional Forecasters showed expectations for only a 1.9% increase in gross domestic product this year.

Walmart has caught a tailwind. According to MasterCard SpendingPlus, Black Friday retail sales rose 4.1% compared to last year. It described consumer spending by adding that “momentum builds.”

Before the good news, Walmart had already posted a strong third quarter. Revenue rose by 5.8% in the most recently reported quarter to $179.5 billion. Per-share earnings rose from $0.57 to $0.77. Management commented, “For fiscal year 2026, the Company raises outlook for growth in net sales to 4.8% to 5.1% and adjusted operating income to 4.8% to 5.5%.”

Walmart’s stock is up 22% this year, compared to 16% for the market overall. However, investors have not been so optimistic in recent years. Walmart’s performance trailed the S&P 500 from November 2020 until August 2024. There was a continued fear that e-commerce and a phalanx of smaller competitors would keep its sales growth less than modest.

The Black Friday news means that holiday spending will be solid. A rising tide lifts all boats, and, among U.S. retailers, the largest boat lifted is Walmart.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.