Wal-Mart de Mexico Keeps Up Strong Sales Growth
Walmex posts 9.9% sales increase in second quarter
MEXICO CITY—Retailer Wal-Mart de Mexico racked up another strong quarter of sales growth between April and June, with sales rising 9.9% from the second quarter of 2014.
Wal-Mart de Mexico, or Walmex as the unit of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is known, said Monday its sales in Mexico and Central America rose 8.1% in June to 37.13 billion Mexican pesos ($2.36 billion), bringing the total for the first half of the year to 224.71 billion pesos, a 9.6% rise from the year-earlier period.
Same-store sales in Mexico, which only include stores that have been open at least one year, rose 3.6% in June and were up 5.2% in the first six months of the year. Second-quarter sales of 113.55 billion pesos marked a 9.9% increase from a year earlier, exceeding the 9.3% gain in the first quarter and the biggest rise in more than two years.
“We remain positive on the sales growth outlook for the company given its commercial strategy and the recovery in employment, remittances and consumer confidence in Mexico,” Banorte bank said in a note ahead of the sales report.
Mexico’s largest retailer is seeking to come back from several years of sluggish growth, with declines in the number of customers visiting its stores.
Earlier this year, the company cut its investment plans for 2015 and is seeking to expand its floor space by 2.4%, adding 162,000 square meters compared with 258,000 square meters added in 2014.
Walmex, which in the past year has sold its restaurant chain and its Mexican bank, had 2,993 stores in operation at the end of June, 2,300 of them in Mexico.
Walmex shares traded on the Mexican stock exchange closed up 1.9% at 39.08 pesos Monday ahead of the report. The company plans to publish its second-quarter financial results on July 21.
