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- Walmart is bracing for billions of dollars in additional fuel costs due to higher diesel prices.
- The company previously said it would put much of its $2.9 billion tariff refund toward lower prices.
- Now, higher fuel costs are likely to erase that benefit, and other retailers are likely to follow.
Just when US shoppers might have thought they dodged the tariff jab, energy costs are coming in with the right hook.
Deutsche Bank says Walmart executives are now expecting the added cost of higher diesel prices to wipe out their total expected benefit from tariff refunds and push prices back up, according to a Thursday analyst note following a meeting with Walmart CFO John David Rainey.
"Elevated diesel is pressuring WMT directly through transportation costs and indirectly as suppliers pass through higher costs, including on petroleum-linked products," the analysts wrote. "Elevated diesel costs are beginning to flow through to consumer prices"
The company is now expecting an additional half to one percentage point of inflation in 2027, the note said. At that rate, additional fuel costs this year and next year will completely erase Walmart's $2.9 billion tariff refund.
Walmart said in August that it had been putting the bulk of that tariff refund money toward lower prices for shoppers.
"Like other retailers, we are not immune to sustained increases in fuel and transportation costs, but we work to minimize their impact," a spokesperson told Business Insider.
The spokesperson also said that many of Walmart's current discounts and holiday deals are time-bound, after which some prices may return to regular levels.
"That should not be characterized as a broad-based price increase," the spokesperson said.
Beyond Walmart, which runs one of the most efficient supply chains in all of retail, the energy impact could be even more pronounced.
The Deutsche Bank analysts noted that competing retailers are also hiking prices in similar categories, leaving Walmart with the relative low-price advantage. The bank also upgraded its rating of Walmart's stock.