Why would selling off some stores improve a company's value?
Two different takes on an answer; the net-loss concept you mentioned and a core-business concept. If a store is actually a net-loss, and anybody is willing to buy it, it may well make sense to sell it.  Depending on your capital value invested, and how much it would take you to make it profitable, it may be a sound business decision to sell the asset.  The buyer of the asset is of course expecting for some reason to make it not a net loss for them (perhaps they have other stores in the vicinity and can then share staff or stock somehow). The core-business is a fuzzier concept.  Investors seem to go in cycles, like can like well-diversified companies that are resilient to a market downturn in one sector, but then they also like so-called pure-play companies, where you are clear on what you are owning.  To try an example (which is likely not the case here), lets say that Sunoco in 5% of its stores had migrated away from a gas-station model to a one-stop-gas-and-repairs model. Therefore they had to have service bays, parts, and trained staff at those locations.  These things are expensive, and could be seen as not their area of expertise (selling gas). So as an investor, if I want to own gas stations, I don't want to own a full service garage, so perhaps I invest in somebody else. Once they sell off their non-core assets, they free up capital to do what they know best. It is at least one possible explanation. "I'd like to modify the ""loss"" idea that's been mentioned in the other two answers.  I don't think a retail location needs to be losing money to be a candidate for sale.  Even if a retail location is not operating at a loss, there may be incentive to sell it off to free up cash for a better-performing line of business. Many large companies have multiple lines of business.  I imagine Sunoco makes money a few ways including: refining the gas and other petroleum products, selling those petroleum products, selling gas wholesale to franchised outlets or other large buyers, licensing their brand to franchised outlets, selling gas and convenience items direct to consumers through its own corporate-owned retail outlets, etc. If a company with multiple lines of business sees a better return on investment in certain businesses, it may make sense to sell off assets in an under-performing business in order to free up the capital tied up by that business, and invest the freed-up capital in another business likely to perform better. So, even ""money making"" assets are sometimes undesirable relative to other, better performing assets. Another case in which it makes sense to sell an asset that is profitable is when the market is over-valuing it.  Sell it dear, and buy it back cheap later." Maybe the location isn't yet, but will soon become a new loss.  For example older soon out of warranty equipment, new tax laws in the locality soon to take affect or even just declining sales over the past periods of measurement. Perhaps labor disputes or other locality issues make running the store difficult.   There is the possibility that the land the location occupies is worth more sold to the new big box retailer than it will be in the next 10 years of operation. In some cases, companies want to have a ton of cash on hand, or would sell assets to pay off debt.
Operationally they wouldn't be too bad off if not for their debt. With declining sales and powerful competitors, they lack the cash flow to both compete and pay off their debt as it matures and while they've been able to refinance so far the doom and gloom outlook that some investors have right now on retailers makes it harder. If they could restructure they would come out in pretty decent shape though. Unless other people believe you have a reason for selling at a lower price, your sale probably has no lasting effect at all on the market. Of course, if people see you dump a few million dollars' worth of shares at a discount, they may be inclined to believe you have a reason. But if you just sell a few, they will conclude the reason is just that you needed cash in a hurry. Hmm. I appreciate some peoples margins are tighter than others, but in 10 years we've never been so close to the wire that these decisions could significantly effect (or possibly affect?) the viability of the company as a whole. In that case it would be morally right to favour the greater good of the majority, sure. retail has been in a slump for quite a few years now.  these companies are short on cash, cut costs, take on debt to pay manufacturers and fund operating costs, products do not sell, short on cash, cut costs, take on debt again etc  go through this cycle enough times everyone starts to look for exits - banks want to get paid on the loans and retailers want to lower the debt service.  this usually ends up at the door step of a PE shop  these retailers are usually over levered by the time PE ships are involved.  PE adds its own tranches of debt and off to the races the retailers go  many retailers are figuring out consumers just are not interested in buying from them, no cash, cut costs, cannot service debt, Ch 11, likely end up on the doorsteps of another PE shop Companies do both quite often.  They have opposite effects on the share price, but not on the total value to the shareholders.  Doing both causes value to shareholders to rise (ie, any un-bought back shares now own a larger percentage of the company and are worth more) and drops the per-share price (so it is easier to buy a share of the stock).  To some that's irrelevant, but some might want a share of an otherwise-expensive stock without paying $700 for it. As a specific example of this, Apple (APPL) split its stock in 2014 and also continued a significant buyback program: Apple announces $17B repurchase program, Oct 2014 Apple stock splits 7-to-1 in June 2014. This led to their stock in total being worth more, but costing substantially less per share. Most larger corporations need to focus on the bottom line to appease their current and prospective investors. It can actually be quite the vicious cycle, and why people would be better off as a whole if we had more mom and pop stores. Is there some evidence in the article or elsewhere that the purpose is to kill off these competitors rather than simply to compete?  Competition is normally considered good in these kinds of situations, as it cranks out better efficiencies (for which an argument can be made here), but taking actions specifically for the purpose of killing off competition is not good because it reduces the pressures on efficiencies.  Killing off competition by artificially lowering prices below real market value is considered dumping, but I don't really see evidence of that in the article. Is there some hidden somewhere or is the article just trying to make a point without any basis?  I do have concerns about the Amazon play, but sensationalist or bias-driven reporting won't help me puzzle through them. Imagine that I own 10% of a company, and yesterday my portion was valued at $1 Million, therefore the company is valued at $10 Million.  Today the company accepts an offer to sell 1% of the company for $500 Thousand: now my portion is worth $5 Million, and company is worth $50 Million. The latest stock price sets the value of the company. If next week the news is all bad and the new investor sells their shares to somebody else for pennies on the dollar, the value of the company will drop accordingly. Shares are tanking because:  1. Amazon is having SOME impact  2. The market for the last 10 years at least overreacts to fucking everything that happens.  3. A lot of retailers over-expanded. A large amount of the stores retailers are culling have been poor performers. Amazon is what pushed it all over the edge, but it will be fine. Brick and mortar isn't going anywhere in the long-term, a lot of people enjoy going out and shopping as well as the instant gratification of immediately getting what they paid for. There are also plenty of brick and mortar stores that give you customer service , and more importantly knowledge that Amazon can't dream of. They're just not shitty retail giants like Best Buy.   4. A lot of retailers in competitive segments, particularly things like fashion, failed to innovate fast enough. They will be replaced by other retailers that meet market desires better, which in turn may ultimately meet the same fate. The other prominent cycle in retail is the shift from malls to strip malls to outlet centers etc. It's just like fashion, to be honest.   5. I remain concerned about the future of Amazon's foundation - the review system. Gaming the review system is possible now and to be frank, I wouldn't be shocked if a leadership change at Amazon eventually compromises the integrity of the review system by getting in on it The main reason is that a public company is owned by its share holders, and share holders would care about the price of the stock they are owning, therefore the company would also care, because if the price go down too much, share holders become angry and may vote to oust the company's management. "In some cases, when a company purchases a minor stake, they often intend to increase the size of the stake over time. As a reference, note that Coca Cola has increased their stake in Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR) over time. It also adds some ""support"" to the price because these investors may be willing to step in and purchase the stock if there is any distress or poor performance. Finally, its generally a good ""tell"" that the stock has good things going for it and may be subject to additional interest from large investors." If your planning on shorting the stocks be careful, while the value of the retail sector may be declining there will be a lot of back and forth over the next ten years, and as REITs discounts to nav increases, there is huge opportunities for buyouts from developers who have other use ideas for the real estate. The real estate will always have value, even if it's not as a shopping center. The stock exchange here serves as a meeting place for current shareholders who want to sell their shares to someone else. This has nothing to do with liquidation, which is a transaction between the company and its shareholders. A company does not have to be listed on an exchange to make distributions to shareholders. people implicity agree to sell stocks when a company does bad But, remember, when you sell the stock of a company that, in your estimation, 'did bad', someone else had to buy; otherwise, there is no sale. The someone else who bought your shares evidently disagrees with your assessment. Did you sell because the company didn't earn a profit at all? Did it not earn a profit because it's in a dead-end business that is slowly but inevitably declining to zero? Something like Sears Holdings? Or did it not make a profit because it is in an emerging market that will possibly someday become hugely profitable? Something like Tesla, Inc.? Did you sell because the company made a profit, but it was lower than expected? Did they make a lower-than-expected profit because of lower sales? Why were the sales lower? Is the industry declining? Was the snow too heavy to send the construction crews out? Did the company make a big investment to build a new plant that will, in a few years, yield even higher sales and profits? What are the profits year-over-year? Increasing? Declining? Usually, investors are willing to pay a premium, that is more than expected, for a stock in a company with robust growth.  As you can see, the mere fact that a company reported a profit is only one of many factors that determine the price of the shares in the market. Also, Amazon doesn't care about profits as much as it cares about market share. Where before Whole Foods' management had to seek profit growth to keep stockholders happy, I can see Amazon running Whole Foods at a breakeven point or even a loss if it means that it allows Amazon to extend the reach of same-day Prime delivery and overall Prime membership numbers.  I mean, if you think about it, Amazon could basically start turning Whole Foods stores into essentially warehouses for food delivery that also sell food the normal retail way. That would make just breaking even on the stores a better option than if Amazon had built their own same-day Prime food delivery warehouses across the country.