MW Is Walmart now a tech company? Stock surges after AI moves, Nasdaq-100 inclusion.
By Tomi Kilgore
Walmart teams with Google's Gemini to help drive customers to its products
Walmart's focus on technology to drive sales helps lift its stock into record territory.
Shares of Walmart surged into record territory in early Monday trading as the retail behemoth's latest moves highlight its focus on technology to drive sales.
Walmart $(WMT)$ and Alphabet's $(GOOGL)$ Google announced over the weekend that they were teaming up to launch a new shopping experience that will use artificial intelligence through Google's Gemini to help drive customers to products sold at Walmart's stores.
The announcement came about a month after Walmart moved the listing of its stock to the Nasdaq exchange from the New York Stock Exchange, a move that the retailer said aligned with its "tech-powered approach" to its retail strategy.
The stock climbed 3.1% in recent premarket trading, putting it on track to open above its Dec. 15 record close of $116.79. The rally would boost Walmart's market capitalization to above $940 billion, which would make Walmart the 11th most valuable U.S. company.
With Walmart's latest AI move, Gemini's answers to questions for assistance or advice will include products sold at its stores, as part of the new Universal Commerce Protocol, an open standard for AI agent-led commerce that Walmart said it built.
Walmart's AI push makes sense. A report earlier this month from Salesforce (CRM) said shoppers referred to e-commerce sites from AI agents converted into actual sales nine times more often than those referred from social media.
"The transition from traditional web or app search to agent-led commerce represents the next great evolution in retail," said John Furner, Walmart's incoming CEO. "We aren't just watching the shift, we are driving it."
Late Friday, the Nasdaq said it would add Walmart's stock to the Nasdaq-100 Index NDX as of Jan. 20.
While Nasdaq said the index is made up of 100 of the largest nonfinancial companies, it is often referred to as the "tech-heavy" Nasdaq-100, given that the current top 11 weighted components - more than 70% of the total weighting - are technology companies.
Walmart's stock will replace drugmaker AstraZeneca's in the Nasdaq-100. AstraZeneca was the 16th highest-weighted Nasdaq-100 component, with a market cap of $293.6 billion as of Friday's close.
-Tomi Kilgore
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 12, 2026 08:19 ET (13:19 GMT)
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