It didn’t have to be this way. At the start of his tenure, Cornell, who the company announced yesterday will step down as CEO on February 1, was an outsider unafraid to move fast and break things. He had been CEO of a big PepsiCo unit, Michaels Stores, and Sam’s Club before that.

The two retail giants are capitalizing on sustained investment in their technology foundations even as they face economic headwinds.

Target needs a hard reset on strategy, Wall Street believes. And new CEO Michael Fiddelke may not be the person to do it.

Walmart has a three pronged strategy to deal with tariffs, and is making sure shoppers aren't the only ones taking a hit.

Thursday, however, Walmart's (WMT) second-quarter earnings missed Wall Street estimates, and the shares slid 4.5% to $97.93. The tumble was felt broadly across the stock market. Walmart, which has a market capitalization of about $782 billion,

Fiddelke acknowledged many of these problems on Wednesday, saying Target was “urgently adjusting” to tariffs and changing consumer needs, embracing technology to automate manual work, and working to mend problems like slow decision-making, siloed internal goals, and a lack of access to quality data that would drive better inventory planning.

Walmart continues to gain momentum — and market share — as back-to-school shopping winds down, leaving competitors like Target struggling to keep up. Executives at both companies said they remain cautious about the all-important holiday shopping season,

But today's focus is on the state of retail, with Walmart (WMT) reporting a mixed second quarter and Target (TGT) delivering another weak quarter on Tuesday. Both of these earnings reports couldn’t have been more different, though each clearly showed the ...