The chief executive of South Africa's Massmart will step down this year, the company said on Friday, after overseeing seven years of steady growth and engineering the sale of a majority stake to U.S. retailer Wal-Mart Stores.Grant Pattison will be replaced by his deputy, Chief Operating Officer Guy Hayward, from June 1, the discount retailer said in a statement. He will remain on the board as a non-executive director until the end of December.Pattison is best known for steering the sale of a 53 percent in Massmart to Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer. The high-profile 2011 deal was seen as a major vote of confidence in the retail potential in Africa's most developed economy.However, it also sparked months of wrangling with unions and South Africa's government over conditions, including the use of local suppliers.
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (Walmart), operates retail stores in various formats globally. Shares of WMT fell by 1.39% or $-1.08/share to $76.89. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $71.51 and as high as $81.37. On average, 7147700 shares of WMT exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 7599640.
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