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Amazon to usurp Wal-Mart as world’s biggest retailer

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By John Glenday, Reporter

August 6, 2012 | 2 min read

It may not have any stores but internet retailer Amazon is set to overtake the mighty Wal-Mart as the world’s largest retailer by 2020 according to the former chief executive of Asda.

In a wide ranging interview with the Telegraph Andy Bond foresaw a ‘period of vast change’ on the horizon in which Amazon would catch up with and then eclipse Asda’s parent company.

Wal-Mart’s current valuation of $252bn is more than double that of Amazon, which sits on $106bn, but these stats could soon invert as the internet revolution gathers steam.

Bond, who now heads online bicycle retailer Wiggle and fashion company Republic, said: “No one should underestimate what internet companies are doing to the retail industry. We’re in a period of vast change. Almost certainly Amazon will have toppled, or at least be vying with, Wal-Mart for the top slot in 2020. Ten years ago people would have said that was ridiculous.”

Bond also took the opportunity to take a swipe at the ‘gratuitous’ pay packets of top executives, warning that “Things have got out of control” as well sticking up for Britain’s hard pressed dairy farmers by calling for a switch in focus away from ‘low prices’.

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