When the biggest retailer in the US reports its earnings, you can bet there will be plenty to unpack, which is why we’ve combed through Walmart’s Q1 quarterly reports and investor calls to find the most interesting data points and quotes.

Here are some of the biggest takeaways:

Simply unpredictable: To start, Walmart is holding off on issuing guidance for Q2 due to economic uncertainty surrounding tariffs, which even at a reduced rate could throw the company’s accounting out of whack.

“Given the dynamic nature of the backdrop, and the range of near-term outcomes being exceedingly wide and difficult to predict, we felt it best to hold from providing a specific range of guidance for operating income growth and EPS for the second quarter,” CFO John David Rainey said in a statement.

In a buy-side investor call, Rainey elaborated on what’s going on: Since tariffs could significantly increase costs, it’s hard to determine what markups will be for the coming quarter. Especially if tariff rates continue to change, the company could find itself in a position where it has marked up inventory costs based on a 30% rate, but then has to mark down that inventory after the rate is cut.

It also can’t be certain of how consumer demand will respond to higher prices, making sales projections more difficult.

Keep reading here.—AV

In its first full quarter since rolling back its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts in January—a move that spurred consumer backlash including an ongoing boycott—Target announced that net sales fell 2.8% YoY and that, far from making it up over the next three quarters, it was projecting a “low single-digit decline in sales” for the year.

While CEO Brian Cornell has recently tried to address the DEI backlash, including meeting with civil rights leader the Reverend Al Sharpton and issuing a letter to employees many found underwhelming, he studiously avoids uttering the term itself.

Try, for example, to spot the DEI reference when, after saying inflation was a factor for sales declines during the earnings call, Cornell added, “We faced several additional headwinds this quarter, including five consecutive months of declining consumer confidence, uncertainty regarding the impact of potential tariffs, and the reaction to the updates we shared on belonging in January.”

If your decoder ring didn’t catch it, when Target rolled back its diversity efforts in January, and removed (archived version) the DEI page on its website, it replaced it with a page that doesn’t even mention “diversity” called “Belonging at the Bullseye.”

Keep reading here.—AAN

A core concept of retail economics, price elasticity, is getting some play in recent days as big box chains The Home Depot and Walmart signaled to investors that they’re keeping a close eye on how tariff-induced price changes could impact demand.

The concept is fairly straightforward: Price elasticity is the measure of how price variations impact demand. If a price change swings demand in one direction or another, then a price is elastic. If it has little or no effect, that price is inelastic.

The question retailers are asking themselves now is: As costs rise in response to tariffs, and prices follow suit, how exactly will consumers respond?

Answering that question could determine if retailers find themselves with too little or too much inventory in the months ahead.

Keep reading here.—AV