NEWS

Amazon.com Inc., far from dominating the retail sector, is actually the weakest of the big U.S. players based on operating results, Moody’s Investors Service said Wednesday.

The e-commerce giant is the subject of a number of myths regarding its size and clout that mask the reality of its position compared with rivals like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. WMT, +0.38% and Costco Wholesale Corp. COST, +0.96% , according to Charlie O’Shea, Moody’s vice president and lead retail analyst.

Amazon’s stock AMZN, -0.24% has outperformed rivals, but it’s mostly based on the company’s growth story, and particularly the success of its cloud business, Amazon Web Services, O’Shea wrote in a new report.

“That potential is overshadowing the superior real-time operating performance of Amazon’s key retail competitors,” O’Shea

wrote. “The emphasis on stock performance is, in our view, forcing brick-and-mortar competitors toward managing more

irrationally for short-term performance just when they’re confronting secular change.”

He cited as an example Staples Inc.’s SPLS, +0.05% decision to sell itself to private-equity firm Sycamore Partners as a way to boost shareholder value.

Source: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazon-is-actually-the-weakest-of-the-big-us-retailers-2017-08-30