"Walmart arm did not deliberately remove Xinjiang goods, China exec tells analysts", 5 January 2022

Walmart Inc (WMT.N) arm Sam's Club, responding to the furore in China over what local media said was its deliberate removal of Xinjiang-sourced products from its app, denied the move in a call with analysts and termed it "a misunderstanding".

Chinese social media users and local news outlets criticised Sam's Club, a members only warehouse club that offers products and services, last week for the removal of the products from its domestic online stores. China's anti-graft agency accused the U.S. retailer and Sam's Club of "stupidity and short-sightedness" over the matter.

A Sam's Club representative told local analysts in a call organised by a domestic securities firm last week that Chinese consumers failed to find products from Xinjiang because the app does not support searches for products based on names of places. [...]

Walmart did not respond to a request for comment. Neither Walmart nor Sam's Club has commented publicly so far on the backlash against them in China and Zhang did not comment on the situation at Walmart, which was also accused of removing products from the far western Chinese region, from both its offline stores and app. [...]