Corporate Bits | Chow Tai Fook full-year profit misses estimates

Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group Ltd.’s full-year profit fell as much as 50 percent as weak Chinese consumer demand undercuts revenue and the world’s largest jewelry retailer posted hedging losses on gold loans.
Profit for the year that ended March 31 decreased 40 percent to 50 percent compared to the previous year, the company said in a Hong Kong stock exchange filing yesterday, citing a preliminary review. Analysts had estimated a 36 percent decrease in net income, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The company issued a similar warning in November for first-­half earnings, which plunged 42 percent from a year earlier due to weaker sales in Hong Kong and Macau.
China’s economic slowdown and anti-corruption campaigns have hurt luxury retailers in Hong Kong and Macau, as Chinese tourists, who account for almost a third of luxury spending globally, are skipping the shopping mecca for other travel destinations. Hong Kong retail sales fell 12 percent in the first quarter, with jewelry and watch sales plummeting nearly double that.

walmart sharpens amazon attack

Walmart is sharpening its attack on Amazon.com. The world’s largest retailer is trimming its free-shipping pilot program to two days from a three, and it’s cutting a dollar off the membership price. Membership is now USD49 per year.
Walmart began testing the new service last year in answer to Amazon Prime’s two-day shipping, a big part of its domination of the retail sector.
Amazon membership costs $99 a year, which comes with a bewildering array of perks, including household product subscriptions, one and two hour Prime Now delivery, streaming music and video, photo storage and more.
“Prime has become an all-­you-can-eat, physical-digital hybrid,” Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos wrote in his annual shareholder letter last month. He wants the service to be such a good deal that you’d be “irresponsible” not to sign up, he wrote.