South Africa's Woolworths Holdings posted a double-digit rise in full-year profit on Thursday as affluent shoppers kept spending on organic jam and ostrich steaks despite the weak economy.Woolworths, a food and clothing retailer similar to Britain's Marks and Spencer, is one of the industry's few recent strong performers, as most South African consumers have been suffered under poor economic growth and rising debt.Its results were in stark contrast to those of another retailer, Massmart Holdings. The Wal-Mart Stores unit reported a 25 percent tumble in first-half profit, reflecting the knock-on effect from waves of strikes this year."The higher income group is the only one that really has disposable income," said Wayne McCurrie, a portfolio manager with Momentum Wealth. "Obviously, the lower-end consumers, the debt levels are very high."
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (Walmart), operates retail stores in various formats globally. Shares of WMT fell by 0.28% or $-0.21/share to $75.64. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $71.51 and as high as $81.37. On average, 5653550 shares of WMT exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 1017311.
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