WAL-MART STORES INC. $72 (New York symbol WMT; Conservative Growth Portfolio: Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 3.2 billion; Market cap: $230.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.5; Dividend yield: 2.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.walmart.com) has paid an undisclosed sum for the 49% of Chinese e-commerce website Yihaodian.com it didn’t already own.
To spur the growth of online retail, the Chinese government recently relaxed foreign ownership restrictions on some Internet businesses. Owning all of Yihaodian.com will make it easier for Wal-Mart to co-ordinate inventory with its physical stores. The purchase will also help the company profit as younger Chinese shoppers buy more goods online.
Wal-Mart is a buy.