Episode summary
Daybreak Holiday: Walmart, Nvidia, OpenAI | Bloomberg Daybreak: US Edition
Bloomberg Daybreak: US Edition
· · Hosts: Nathan Hager · Guests: Jen Bartashas, Poonam Goyal, Mandeep Singh, Kunjan Soubhani, Matthew Schettenhelm
Summary
Walmart is framed as a steady beneficiary of consumer value-seeking, even after a flat December retail sales report. The analysts say Walmart is gaining share because shoppers want convenience, lower prices and a broader assortment, and they expect the company’s e-commerce business to keep growing as Walmart invests in logistics, marketplace expansion and membership stickiness through Walmart Plus. Grocery remains a key driver, but they argued that strength is showing up across general merchandise and that Walmart is well positioned against Amazon and dollar-store rivals.
Nvidia is expected to post another blowout quarter, with the analysts linking its revenue trajectory to hyperscaler capital spending that could rise another 60% in 2026. They said Nvidia should benefit from a roughly $650 billion AI spending plan at the major cloud providers, but they also flagged memory prices and supply-chain pressure as near-term risks. Even so, they argued Nvidia’s scale, priority access to memory and expanding businesses in networking, CPUs and software should help it keep growing for the next two to three years.
The legal segment focused on Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI and the Justice Department’s case against Live Nation and Ticketmaster. The litigation analysts said Musk’s biggest leverage may be forcing changes to OpenAI’s structure rather than winning his claimed tens of billions in damages, while Live Nation appears vulnerable because of its dominant market position and alleged exclusionary conduct, though a settlement remains possible.
Key takeaways
- Walmart is seen as thriving on value-seeking behavior, with analysts saying flat retail sales do not materially change its growth outlook.
- The analysts expect Walmart e-commerce sales to keep gaining share as online shopping rises from an estimated 25% of U.S. retail sales to 33% in the next few years.
- Nvidia’s outlook is tied to hyperscaler capex, which one analyst said could rise another 60% in 2026 and keep revenue growth near that level.
- Memory pricing is a risk for Nvidia, but the analysts said its scale and priority in data-center supply should help it absorb the pressure better than smaller rivals.
- Elon Musk’s OpenAI lawsuit may matter more for forcing structural changes than for the huge damages numbers he is seeking, according to the litigation analyst.
- Live Nation faces a strong DOJ antitrust case, but the analyst said a settlement or expanded consent order could still resolve it.
Notable quotes
“People are seeking value. people are seeking um you know ways to to to to streamline their time and and and find convenience and Walmart just seems to be gaining share”
“We expect Walmart to be no different. They've put a lot of investment behind their e-commerce unit and they have been very quickly gaining share”
“consensus is forecasting almost a 60% increase in Nvidia's topline for 2026”
“we think Nvidia should be okay. Uh the smaller much more uh not sophisticated players and players outside of the data center will see some impact”
“I think potentially the bigger risk for for OpenAI and and Microsoft might be the changes to its model going forward”
How the episode opens
Hello everybody and thank you so much for joining us for this special edition of Bloomberg Daybreak. US markets are closed for the President's Day holiday. I'm Nathan Hager.
Coming up this hour, we'll look ahead to a couple of major lawsuits on the docket. Elon Musk's battle against Open AI and the Justice Department's case against Live Nation and Ticket Master. We'll break them down with two of our litigation analysts from Bloomberg Intelligence, Matthew Suttinghelm on Big Tech and Jennifer Ree on Big Ticket.
Plus, we have a big earnings report coming up from AI behemoth Nvidia. BI analysts Mandep Singh and Kunjan Sapani will be along to preview those results. Before that though, we hear from the world's biggest big box retailer this week.
Walmart reports earnings on Thursday. Here to get us set for that report are Bloomberg Intelligence senior analyst Jennifer Bartacis who covers retail staples and Punam Goyle who's got things covered on the e-commerce side. Thanks to both of you for being with us.
You know, coming off the flat retail sales report for December that we saw recently, Jennifer, I'll start with you. How does that affect what we could see from Walmart when it comes to the earnings this week?
You know what what's interesting is that for Walmart, it doesn't matter so much what the retail sales do just because the trends that are in place have really been conducive to their growth in their business. People are seeking value. people are seeking um you know ways to to to to streamline their time and and and find convenience and Walmart just seems to be gaining share based on their ability to to to offer that to their customers.
So regardless of the macro environment, Walmart really seems to be thriving at the moment.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- walmart earnings
- nvidia outlook
- ai semiconductors
- openai litigation
- president's day markets
Companies and tickers mentioned
- WMT
- NVDA
- Walmart
- Nvidia
- OpenAI
Watch the episode
Watch “Daybreak Holiday: Walmart, Nvidia, OpenAI | Bloomberg Daybreak: US Edition” on YouTube
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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