00:00All right, let's take a look at shares of Walmart right now.
00:02They are off by three and a quarter percent because the company is just announcing that Doug McMillan,
00:07the chairman and CEO, is going to be retiring.
00:10He's stepping down from the company where he has been in charge for more than 12 years.
00:16During that time, Doug McMillan has more than quadrupled Walmart's market cap.
00:21He's also set the company up for continued growth.
00:23He's been seen as somebody who is not only a stalwart leader, but also a visionary leader for a retailer
00:31in particular.
00:33I don't know if you remember, Doug McMillan at one point did an interview with us.
00:36He took out of his pocket a list of all the retailers, the top 10 retailers over every decade,
00:41and talked about how they changed all the time.
00:43And that lived pretty large in his mind.
00:45As a result, he did some really innovative things when it came to adding a lot of digital capacity,
00:52changing things in the stores.
00:54He raised the salaries for people and refurbished the stores at a time when it was not popular on Wall
00:59Street.
00:59There was a big revolt when he first announced that.
01:01And it was the Walton family that stood by him during that time and said, this is the way to
01:06go.
01:06He did things like add an advertising unit to the company, which nobody ever thought about that.
01:12Advertising unit that also worked as digital online sales.
01:16What's the story behind the story? He's only 59.
01:18He's only 59. I am told that this was his choice, that he wants to step down at this point.
01:24I believe it because I can't imagine anybody wanting to chase him out of there.
01:28And as a result, again, that stock is off by three and a half percent.
01:32Who's the successor?
01:33Here's the successor.
01:34John Ferner, who is 51 years old.
01:37He's actually been there starting as an hourly associate.
01:41He's been with the company for over 30 years.
01:44He's going to be the incoming CEO for the entire company.
01:50John Ferner is somebody who sounds an awful lot like the person that Doug McMillan was when he took over
01:59all those years ago.
02:01Doug McMillan started as an intern at Walmart and was actually driving chucks and supplying things,
02:10like unloading boxes at Walmart when he first started out and stayed with them his entire career.
02:16Ferner is somebody who started as an hourly associate.
02:19He's been there for over 30 years.
02:20He's been in a variety of leadership roles across all three of their operating segments.
02:25And the company is saying he understands every dimension of the business from the sales floor to the global strategy.
02:31He's a razorback.
02:32University of Arkansas.
02:34So he's local.
02:35Yeah, but this is a shocker.
02:37Doug McMillan, because he's so young to be stepping down, not even yet 60.
02:41But he also has kept up a pretty incredible pace over that period of time.
02:46Again, if you look at a 10-year chart, that stock is up by 426 percent.
02:52And Doug has been a pretty steady hand and an innovative guy through all of this.
02:56He ran the business roundtable for a period of time.
03:00He's been involved in all sorts of big policy questions in America.
03:03I mean, even far beyond just even his role at Walmart.
03:07I think he's considered sort of one of the great stalwarts of both retail, but even more broadly American business.
03:14Think about what he was doing during the pandemic.
03:17It's unusual, but not unheard of.
03:18I can think of, like, Steve Burke.
03:21That's like the only guy where you go out.
03:24It's good to go out on top sometimes.
03:26Iger tried it, and then they pulled him back in like G3.
03:32We'll continue to watch this.
03:33The stock's off by about 3 percent.
03:35Walmart is saying that what they want to do is give a very long runway to John Furner,
03:40just like Doug McMillan had all that time ago.
03:42So bringing in someone who is young, who has still been there for more than 30 years.
03:48But he couldn't have a long time to be there.
03:50John's leaving, too.
03:51I don't know.
03:52Is he?
03:52He might just be 60.
03:54Right in that age range.
03:56Yeah.
03:56Procter & Gamble.
03:57So there's Procter & Gamble and Walmart.
03:59Wow.
04:00Big stalwarts of the Dow.
04:02Yeah.
04:03All right.
04:03That's what we know for now.
04:04We'll continue to watch it.
04:05Yep.
