Looks like we’re celebrating “Take Your Beer to Work” day again here at Stock Gumshoe… it’s awfully nice to see that week come to a close.

This was the week that a possible recession and continuing strong inflation started to seem “real” to more people — it’s hard to guess when worries will reach the tipping point and start to really spill over into action, but it tends to be a headline moment that makes people sit up and take notice.

For the emerging coronavirus that became COVID-19, I think the turning point was when Tom Hanks got the virus; for inflation and recession, it might have been this week, when Target and Walmart both reported shockingly bad results and told us that they were freaking out (OK, they didn’t use those words). Those particular moments may not be specifically critical to whatever was happening in the real world, and you can’t predict them in advance, but sometimes they crystallize the worries that are floating in the ether and give people the, “uh oh, this is REAL” panic moment.

Tom Hanks got the coronavirus? This is serious! Close the borders!

Walmart can’t figure out how to make money? Uh-oh! What hope does any lesser company have?

This is an awful time to be a retailer, as Target (TGT) and Walmart (WMT) have told us, trying to deal with the incoming rush of wholesale price increases and the uncertain supply of a lot of goods (and the rising cost of workers) without losing their “discount” reputation or pressuring shoppers so much that they stay home. Both companies sell a lot of groceries, and that part of the business is doing OK, people gotta eat, but they make their money by selling other stuff that’s a lot more optional, at better margins, and those sales are hurting right now. And, as you would imagine, those in the bottom half of the income distribution, who are more likely to depend on Walmart or Target as their primary retailer, are feeling the pain of inflation much more dramatically than those in the top half. That pressure is percolating through to the other retailers who’ve reported recently as well, and there aren’t a lot of places to hide… even Costco (COST), which has at times seemed even more bulletproof than Walmart, has dropped 30% (color me tempted, but it’s still not ...