Hard for me to process that such a huge investment was made without taking into account all the possibilities of what might happen. Just hope this Flipkart thing doesn't turn into a bottomless pit in which the company will through money.
https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/economy/policy/comment-walmart-cant-just-exit-flipkart-investment-even-if-it-wants-to-3498851.html
Any Buyers yet?......Earnings are soon to be released
I still think Flipkart will wind up being a massive write down. Just awful.
I bet if we could find a buyer and there weren’t egos involved, we’d drop it like a hot potato.
There are lots of buyers for Flipkart - after all it has no profit. All we did was buy sales so we could say internet sales are up. I bet someone would be willing to pay pennies on the dollar for Flipkart. All WMT cares about is identity politics, diversity and inclusion, and equality of results. WMT is a political action committee.
There is no buyer for Flipkart. WM will have to continue with Flipkart in the foreseeable future. Current crop of leadership is not committed and selfish. Sad but reality. Lore must be trying to find a way to exit. Bansals were lucky.
Walmart will fade away just like Sears. And while this is happening, people will be fighting to see who can virtue signal the most and fight those nasty micro-aggressions that all of the Snowflakes fear the most. It reflects the decline of our country. We all fiddle while Rome burns.
@nho “identity politics” and “social justice warriors” have nothing to do with anything going on at Walmart. Walmart’s fails are their own, and it’s been coming for a long time. They have been TOO conservative for their own good and failed to adapt. They did what conservatives do and chose to pretend it was still the 1950s and nothing would ever change.
@ nho, you are very correct. Historian James Henton, who has researched America's wealthiest families and business empires, put it this way: "The first generation makes it, the second one squanders it and the third one fizzles entirely. This seems model to be reliable as a cookie recipe."
The current crop of leaders have no clue. They are busy spending all of the Walton's money. The Company is run by outside consultants that charge $10,000 for a powerpoint slide. The money will run out eventually, probably take 10 years to wind down. I will be retired long before that. Should be fun to watch. You all should stock up on popcorn and enjoy the show.
I agree with FQN. I think it’s actually gross negligence that the company paid such an obscene amount of money to try to do business in a country that is so historically protectionist.
The sad thing is, I highly doubt the current leadership will admit they just tee-teed away that much of the Walton’s money. They’ll keep trying to make it work. The next leadership group will likely have to be the ones to leave India unless I miss my guess.
Meanwhile I bet they keep taking a hacksaw to the US business to try to fund international and dotcom.
WMT is too busy worshipping Identity Politics to focus on the bottom line. The 3rd generation will destroy the company. They spend all of their time listening to social justice warriors.
They should have realized that they could not operate something like this when they learned that they could not open any "Stand Alone" WMT stores in the country - Had to run them as a joint venture.
I really won't feel sorry for WMT if they have to walk away from their Flipcart investment and take a loss - its not like they haven't walked away from an investment before (Germany, Indonesia, South Korea.....etc)
This is what happens when you follow the practice of getting rid of all the "Tribal" Knowledge. The newly minted Ivy League MBA's (or European Imports) will repeat the same mistakes that their predecessors did - Simply because they got rid of those that had "Seen It, Done It and Gotten a T Shirt) did as they have no one to learn from - Text Books and Case Study's DON'T run stores nor do they tell you how to be a Winner.
If your not the lead dog....the view never changes.