84-year-old Dividend King tops $1 trillion valuation milestone

Walmartrecently crossed the $1 trillion market cap threshold and is now up an impressive 510% over the past decade.

If we adjust for dividend reinvestments, cumulative returns for the Dow Jones 30 member is closer to 630%, since February 2016, according to data from Y-charts.

It’s a remarkable milestone for an 84-year-old company that started with a single discount store in Rogers, Arkansas, in 1962, founded by Sam Walton on one simple idea: sell things cheaper than anyone else.

That idea still runs the show. But Walmart (WMT) has quietly become something much more than a big-box retailer.

Walmart joins tech giants in the trillion-dollar club

Walmart joins an exclusive group of tech giants, including Apple, Microsoft, Meta, Nvidia, Alphabet, and Amazon. 

Walmart’s stock has surged more than 28% over the past year, and over 20% so far in 2026.

WMT stock has outpaced the broader market by a meaningful margin, given the S&P 500 is up 12% over the past year. 

The retailer’s inclusion in the Nasdaq 100 last month sent the clearest signal yet about how Wall Street now sees Walmart. It’s no longer just a retailer competing on price. It’s a technology-enabled business with growing, high-margin revenue streams.

Related: Walmart customer shift is reality check for Target, Amazon

What’s driving that? Three things: a booming e-commerce platform, a fast-growing advertising business, and a third-party marketplace that’s rapidly expanding its product assortment.

For its fiscal 2026 third quarter, reported in November, Walmart posted revenue growth of 5.8%. E-commerce sales jumped 27%, and its advertising business grew 53%. The company guided for full-year sales growth of 4.8% to 5.1%.

New CEO John Furner, who officially took over on Feb. 1, inherits a company on a strong run.

As head of Walmart’s U.S. business before the promotion, Furner was one of the key architects behind the gains, including curbside pickup and private-label expansion, that helped draw higher-income shoppers into stores.

WMT stock offers a growing dividend

For investors who care about dividends, Walmart’s credentials are hard to beat. The recession-resistant heavyweight first paid a dividend in 1974 and has raised it for 52 consecutive years, earning it the title of Dividend King. 

Walmart currently pays a quarterly dividend of $0.235 per share. Its annual dividend expense totals roughly $7.5 billion, while the company is forecast at $14.6 billion in fiscal 2026 (ended in January), indicating a payout ratio of 51%.

Analysts tracking WMT stock forecast the FCF to expand to $24.8 billion by fiscal 2029, while the annual dividend per share could touch $1.13. 

Key dividend metrics for WMT stock:

• Annual dividend per share: $0.94
• Quarterly dividend per share: $0.235
• Dividend yield: approximately 0.70%
• Payout ratio: approximately 51% of FCF
• Consecutive years of dividend increases: 52 years
• Dividend growth (past 10 years): approximately 3.44% annualized
• Dividend frequency: Quarterly

Walmart’s dividend yield of roughly 0.70% is below the consumer defensive sector average of about 2.53%. That gap reflects how much the stock has run up, given a rising share price compresses the yield, even as the actual dollar payout grows.

More Dividend Stocks:

• Cisco stock resets dividend payout as AI moat widens
• Broadcom could sustain its eye-popping 2026 dividend hike
• Oracle dividend growth signals new era for cloud titan

The payout ratio indicates the dividend is well covered and leaves ample room for further increases. Typically, a payout ratio below 60% is generally considered healthy.

The yield won’t turn heads for pure income investors. But the combination of a growing payout, a rock-solid balance sheet, and 52 years of unbroken increases makes WMT stock a reliable anchor in a dividend-focused portfolio.

Walmart aims to expand AI investments

At the ICR Conference in January, Daniel Danker, Walmart’s executive vice president of AI acceleration, product, and design, laid out the vision plainly.

Danker told investors: Walmart has struck partnerships with both OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. The idea is straightforward: meet customers wherever they are, even if that’s not on Walmart.com.

• A shopper searching for how to get a wine stain out of a carpet on Gemini may not be thinking about buying anything.
• But that search could end with a recommendation and a single-click Walmart checkout for a carpet-cleaning product.
• These are shopping moments that never would have reached Walmart before.

Think of it this way: The Google partnership goes a step further. When a customer discovers something on Gemini, Walmart’s own AI agent activates within the Gemini interface, pulling in the customer’s existing cart, membership perks, and personalized history.

It’s a seamless handoff between two AI systems.

In stores, associates use an AI-powered app that tells them which shelves to restock first, plots the most efficient path through the store, and flags urgent tasks such as spills in real time. 

On the supply chain side, AI is used to predict which products will be needed in which stores—before customers place their orders.

That’s part of how Walmart has cut its delivery costs by 50% over the past two years.

What next for Walmart stock?

Walmart is expected to report fiscal fourth-quarter earnings later this month, and analysts will closely watch e-commerce growth, advertising revenue, and any updated guidance.

Currently, Walmart stock trades at a forward price-to-earnings multiple of 46x, which is above the 10-year average of 23x. Its lofty valuation suggests the upside potential for WMT stock may be limited in the near term. 

Notably, CFO John Rainey, speaking at the Morgan Stanley Global Consumer & Retail Conference in December, said the company is “just hitting stride” on several fronts. 

“If this is a 100-yard dash, I think we’re barely out of the starting block,” Rainey said.

For a company that opened its doors in the Eisenhower era, Walmart is moving fast. The $1 trillion milestone is a marker, not a ceiling.

Related: Walmart’s stock dividend may surge due to India, China