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WalMart Reports Tariffs Will Drive Costs Up on Key Merchandise
May 15,
2025 by Karen Parrish in Business Strategy, Industry 
While the U.S. and China reached an agreement to pause the ongoing tariff war for 90 days this week to allow for further negotiation, the tariffs that have already been put into place are already beginning to take effect.
WalMart reported on Thursday, that it plans to raise prices this month and into the summer because of the merchandise that is coming to the shelves that will already be affected by the tariffs, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.
“The magnitude and speed at which these prices are coming to us is somewhat unprecedented in history,” Walmart Chief Financial Officer John David Rainey said in an interview.
This quarter was still strong for WalMart, as the full impact of the tariffs has not hit consumer's pockets yet. Many retailers and consumers still have products stockpiled that are pre-tariff merchandise. The economic impact is still on the horizon, although the affect is coming quickly.
According to an article in Barron's, once the import costs started accelerating in May, WalMart CEO Doug McMillon, who had previously stopped short of indicating the chain would increase prices, finally conceded WalMart would have to do so on certain products to protect their profit margins.
Justin McAuliffe, a research analyst at Gabelli Funds, astutely noted, “If Walmart is raising prices, it certainly means that other retailers are going to be raising prices as well.”
However, WalMart can be strategic on the items they raise prices in order to maintain their competitive advantage, while keeping other tariff driven prices lower.
Some believed that WalMart would have kept their prices down and not raised them at all, but if even Walmart couldn't stay insulated from the threat of the tariffs, what does that mean for the other retailers, the consumers and the likelihood of avoiding higher inflation or the possibility of a recession?