Warren Buffett calls Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT) an 'inevitable' and that is why he, and many other value investors such as Joel Greentblatt, Wally Weitz, Tweedy Browne, and Bill Nygren - to name a few - are invested in Wal-Mart.  I too believe Wal-Mart is an inevitable - a company that will continue to thrive for years to come.  Until recently I owned the stock, but sold out the other day.  (I made just enough to cover the transaction fees and a nice dinner.)
 
My original thesis still stands however: Wal-Mart is a great stock and by far one of the safest out there.  I don't think you can go wrong.  In fact, I am positive on that.  Wal-Mart is a much better alternative to holding cash and, at historical low multiples (P/E, Price/Book, Price/Sales, Price/Cash Flow), the stock is cheap.  The street seems to have forgotten that Wal-Mart is still a growth company.  Let's look at the Income Statement for verification:



The Balance Sheet and Cash Flow Statement are just as good.  The company continues to buy back shares every year and use excess cash to open new stores.  The Walton Family also still owns an incredible 40% of the company ($80 billion!).  Now check out the chart:



The above chart shows a concept that a fellow StokBlogs member, schin, introduced me to: Coiled String Theory.  The idea is that earnings accumulate and makes the balance sheet strong while the stock price comes down.  Quality goes up, price comes down (a value investor's dream).  Wal-Mart has been growing earnings and book value every year for the past five years yet the stock price has fallen and now flat-lined.  Eventually, the market will come to its senses and the "string will get sprung".

Anyhow, that is my case for why I bought the stock.  You probably care more about why I sold, however.  Well, readers of my blog will know that I have extremely strong convictions right now about the US Dollar falling, the economy heading into a recession, and the price of oil shooting up into the stratosphere.  Like Wal-Mart stock, I also consider those events an 'inevitable'.  It is just a matter of time.  The only antidote to those events is to own assets that will inflate along with the economy.  Energy and gold stocks are the best of those assets.

Like I said above, Wal-Mart is also better than cash because it is a rock-solid company.  Sure retailer stocks will get hit during poor economic times, but people will continue to shop where there is value - and anybody who has ever walked into a Wal-Mart knows they give their customers the best value.  So the stock should do fine.  But oil and gold will do even better in my opinion.  As an investor, I must stick to my best ideas.  If I could not find any gold or oil stocks worth owning, I would still be holding Wal-Mart.  But I have found more opportunities than I have cash for.  And so my portfolio is now heavily concentrated in those sectors.  Tomorrow I will follow this article up with my thoughts on Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (EPD), which is the main stock I traded Wal-Mart for.