Wal-Mart says Obamacare may hurt sales [View all]

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Right. Never mind that your products for the most part are shitty as is the way you treat your workers.

By Shelly Banjo, The Wall Street Journal

Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) has a long list of reasons its customers aren't spending as much as hoped: the expiration of the payroll tax cut in January, the November rollback of food stamp benefits, and continued uncertainty in Washington, D.C.

Now the world's largest retailer is hinting at a new one: the looming individual mandate to buy health insurance under the Affordable Care Act.

The company attributed a third consecutive drop in U.S. comparable-store sales to a laundry list of macroeconomic headwinds when it reported earnings last week. Wal-Mart, which forecast continued gloominess through year's end, told analysts it would watch to see if the federal health care law would take yet another chunk out of customers' pocketbooks.

"While it is not coming through in customer research, we do know that some of our customers are concerned about the impact of the Affordable Care Act," Carol Schumacher, vice president of investor relations, told analysts on Thursday. "For many of our customers, having to afford health care and insurance may be another line item in their personal budget that they may not have had to cover previously." Wal-Mart says it has 140 million customers a week.

http://money.msn.com/top-stocks/wal-mart-says-obamacare-may-hurt-sales