Walmart Earnings August 20: Consensus Sits on Top of the Guide While Tariffs Move the Price Tags

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Update (August 20, 2026, Mid-Session): The Quarter Beat, the Guide Rose, and the Stock Fell 9%

Walmart reported adjusted EPS of $0.81 against the $0.74 consensus this preview flagged as sitting on the ceiling of the guide, on revenue of $187.9 billion, up 5.9% (5.1% constant currency). Reported operating income rose 28.8% to $9.383 billion. The full-year adjusted EPS guide moved up from $2.75-$2.85 to $2.80-$2.87, and the constant-currency net sales guide from 3.5-4.5% to 4.0-5.0%. Figures from the company's earnings release and its 8-K presentation.

The stock traded at $103.93, down 9.07% from Wednesday's $114.30 close, at 10:45am ET, with a session range of $103.56 to $107.00. That is an intraday snapshot and Thursday's close will differ.

Two things this preview called are worth marking. The tariff ledger did decide the margins: Walmart received about $2.9 billion of IEEPA refunds and CFO John David Rainey put the net benefit at roughly 750 basis points of operating income growth, spending most of the rest on price. And the raise that the preview said was the bull catalyst arrived without conviction, lifting the full-year midpoint about 1.3% after a $2.9 billion windfall. The full arithmetic, and what it costs Q3, is here.

What the preview did not anticipate: US comparable sales ex-fuel of 2.6%, down from 4.1% in Q1 and short of a consensus near 3.67%, the slowest in six years. Global e-commerce grew 23%, advertising 38% and membership fee revenue 17%, so the flywheel this piece described as the thing the multiple is buying kept turning. Q3 constant-currency operating income is guided to grow just 2-4%.

The trade log below is left ungraded until the settled close.

TL;DR

• Walmart reports fiscal Q2 2027 results Thursday, August 20. The company confirmed the schedule on August 13: results at 7:00am ET, conference call at 8:00am ET, hosted by CEO John Furner and CFO John David Rainey. The verdict on the setup sits in the companion piece, is Walmart a buy before this print.
• The familiar trap, retail edition: consensus of $0.74 of adjusted EPS sits at the very top of Walmart's own $0.72-0.74 guide, up from $0.68 a year ago, when the same setup produced a rare miss and a 4% morning drop. Revenue consensus runs around $186 billion, up about 5% from $177.4 billion (aggregator-sourced; the guided frame is net sales up 4-5% constant currency).
• The full-year guide came in light in May, $2.75-2.85 of adjusted EPS against a street then near $2.91, and the stock has drifted about 16% below its May record close of $134.20 to around $113. A raise of the light guide is the bull catalyst on the table.
• The quarter's substance is the tariff whipsaw: Walmart attributed price increases to import duties in the spring, then cut prices on thousands of items in early July. Gross margin commentary on eating versus passing tariff costs is the print's centre, and the cleanest consumer read of the month.
• The flywheel underneath keeps spinning: global e-commerce grew 26% last quarter with US comps up 4.1%, and advertising profitability is the margin story the multiple actually rests on. Results landed August 20 and the update block above carries them.

When Does Walmart Report Earnings?

Thursday August 20, before the market opens, two days after Home Depot opens retail's reporting fortnight. The full retail slate is on the earnings calendar.

The Board

Consensus on top of the guide, a light full-year frame, and a price war with its own price increases.

The Consensus-Above-the-Guide Problem, Again

This season's recurring structure reaches retail: Walmart guided $0.72-0.74, the street sits at $0.74, and the last time expectations perched on top of the range like this (a year ago), Walmart printed $0.68 against $0.73 expected and fell 4% before lunch. The guided operating frame, net sales up 4-5% constant currency, adjusted operating income up 7-10%, is unambitious enough that the print itself should land; it is the $2.75-2.85 full-year EPS guide, set below street numbers in May, that decides the reaction. Holding a light guide after two quarters is itself a statement.

The Tariff Whipsaw: Eat the Cost or Pass It On

Walmart spent the spring explaining that import duties were forcing price increases on affected goods, took the political heat for it, then in early July cut prices on thousands of items, beef to detergent, with the White House claiming credit and Walmart declining to confirm the connection. Somewhere inside that whipsaw is the answer to the only question that matters for margins: how much tariff cost Walmart eats to defend traffic, and how much it passes on into a CPI running hot.

The other side of that trade is share: inflation pushes higher-income households toward Walmart (the trade-down), and the company has been the cycle's biggest share winner. Whether that flywheel is demand or desperation shows up in comp composition: traffic versus ticket.

The Business the Multiple Is Actually Buying

Walmart at a premium multiple is not a grocery bet, it is a bet that e-commerce (up 26% last quarter) and the advertising business attached to it keep converting scale into high-margin revenue. E-commerce profitability and ad growth are the two lines that justify the re-rating of the past three years; any wobble there costs more than a comp miss would.

The Options Angle

No implied move is sourceable this far out, so no volatility plays are logged; the piece gets marked to live numbers nearer the date. The equity frame: a 16% pullback from the record, a light guide with room to raise, and a consensus already at the guide's ceiling make this a raise-or-fade print: the upside case needs the full-year number to move, because the quarter alone cannot clear a bar set at its own top.

Trade log

#	Stance	Structure	Strikes and expiry	Cost or credit	Spot at writing	Implied move	Breakeven
1	Pass	Any pre-print options position	Aug expiries	Not sourced this far out	~$113, Aug 3 close (aggregator-sourced)	Not sourced	n/a; pass scored against the realised move
2	Conditional	Post-print long (shares) if the FY adjusted EPS guide is raised toward the street's number	Struck off the Aug 20 post-open	Struck off the Aug 20 post-open	To be struck Aug 20	n/a	Scored against the post-print entry if triggered

The One-Line Read

Walmart reports with the street sitting on the ceiling of its own guide and a full-year number it deliberately set below expectations, which makes August 20 less about the world's biggest retailer hitting a quarter and more about whether it finally admits the year is going better than it promised, with the tariff ledger deciding how much of that admission the margins can afford.