Wal-Mart's online sales rise

As Wal-Mart tries to ensure it can keep competing with Amazon, the good news for the retailer is their online sales have risen.

Their gross merchandise volume rose 69 percent in the first quarter of 2017. Total revenue climbed to 117.5 billion dollars.

The recent acquisition of Jet.com Inc. proved to be very fruitful for the company.

“All of a sudden, Wal-Mart is the primary competitor to Amazon, as opposed to a fragmented cluster of people,” said Greg Portell, a partner at consulting firm A.T. Kearney, to Bloomberg.

Shares climbed to 76 dollars after the announcement of the results.

Wal-Mart is also one of the few lucky retailers not feeling the decline in brick-and-mortar stores. U.S. same sale stores rose 1.4 percent, beating the original expectation of 1.3 percent. It also marked the 11th consecutive period of growth.

“We’re encouraged by the start to the year,” Chief executive officer Doug McMillon said in a statement. “Our plan is gaining traction.”

While Wal-Mart is confident about their ability to compete with Amazon, some are not so confident they should even be trying.

A recent article in Forbes by Panos Mourdoukoutas said that Wal-Mart will never beat Amazons simply on the grounds of Amazon being a technology company and Wal-Mart isn't. Wal-Mart is a retailer using technology, as Mourdoukoutas puts it, and they will never attract the software developers that help Amazon grow into the business it is.

Photo: via Wal-Mart Facebook page