Consumer Stocks Dip As Walmart, L Brand Earnings Weigh - Consumer Roundup

Shares of retailers and other consumer-services companies fell after Walmart's earnings met with a cool reception. The world's largest retailer by revenue said sales rose in the latest quarter, helped by a strong digital showing and demand for groceries. But to take Amazon.com on on its home turf, Walmart had to adopt some of the company's capital-burning tactics, and investments in improving stores and driving online sales caused expenses to rise and margins fell. Other chains are not as well equipped to dig in against Amazon. L Brands shares slid after the owner of Victoria's Secret chain cut its earnings forecast for 2017, joining a long line of bricks-and-mortar stores that are struggling to grow sales at all. Spam and Skippy peanut butter maker Hormel Foods agreed to buy the Fontanini brand meat and sausage business for $425 million.

-Rob Curran, rob.curran@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 17, 2017 16:38 ET (20:38 GMT)