Brooke Sutherland, Columnist

The Amazon Threat Has Its Limits for This Industrial

Fastenal's emphasis on on-site offerings may pinch margins now, but will help protect it against incursions from the e-commerce giant.

July 12, 2017 at 6:38 PM UTC

By Brooke Sutherland

Brooke Sutherland is Bloomberg News' Boston bureau chief and writes the Industrial Strength Newsletter. She was previously a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals and industrial companies and an M&A reporter for Bloomberg News.

1499885890_pic — Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg

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Investors need to ease up on Fastenal Co.

The $12 billion distributor of nuts, bolts and other industrial parts initially surged as much as much as 6.9 percent on Wednesday after reporting decent second-quarter results, only to give up those gains and tumble by nearly as big a percentage. As of 1:50 p.m. in New York, the shares were down about 2 percent. Investors just couldn't maintain their enthusiasm.