Walmart disposes of Chinese Amazon competitor

Walmart has sold all of its shares in Chinese e-commerce platform JD.com: the American hypermarket giant is looking to conquer the Chinese market on its own.

Logistics champion

For eight years, the retail giant had built up a 5.19 % stake in the Chinese rival to Amazon and Alibaba. Walmart wanted to gain a foothold in the fast-growing Asian online market in this way, but it also wanted to keep rival Amazon at bay. Moreover, JD.com is known for its advanced logistics capabilities, courtesy of AI and automated warehouses: knowledge that the Americans could also benefit from.

Yet the hypermarket giant is now taking a different tack: it has sold all of its shares for 3.74 billion dollars, Reuters reports. Walmart now intends to use that money to improve its own operations in China, aiming to open twice as many warehouses in China for Sam’s Club and retain only a commercial partnership with JD.com.

The sale coincides with a dip in the Chinese consumer market: demand and spending are falling after years of spectacular growth, while rivals Alibaba and Temu owner Pinduoduo have started a fierce price war that is putting further pressure on revenues and margins. Walmart nevertheless recorded 17.7 % sales growth in China in the second quarter.